


Grace Will Lead Us Home

by Philosophizes



Series: Bad Decisions [3]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: A lot of those actually! At least five, Angst, Bigender Character, Broken Families, Demons, Family Drama, Family Secrets, Fantasy, Gen, Government intrigue, Magic, Multi, Murder Mystery, Police Procedural, Politics, Science Fantasy, Science Fiction, Secrets Revealed, Time Travel, Trans Character, broken relationships
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-04
Updated: 2016-04-14
Packaged: 2018-04-12 21:40:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 204,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4495713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Philosophizes/pseuds/Philosophizes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s 2746 and the galaxy sits on three pivot points. </p><p>One, the treaty between the Human Imperial State and the International Republican Confederation.</p><p>Two, the correct solution to a string of murders in Kharad, capital city of Freiezuno. </p><p>Theee, how far four children are willing to go to see their family happy.</p><p>Plenty of ways for things to go wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One Murder, Two Engagements, Three Problems

**Author's Note:**

> All right before we start this thing:
> 
> One, if you're coming here new to this universe, please go start at the beginning, with the _Bad Decisions Series Backstory Fics_ or with the first story in this series, _With Sorrow We Accept Our Fortunes_
> 
> Two, for readers who are all caught up, I figured out how to make the family trees work! [I'm linking you to the links](http://siphilemon.tumblr.com/post/125800959818/family-tree-time), because there's notes to go with it and I'm not typing them up here right before the chapter.

* * *

 

**PART ONE: LESS THAN KIND**

_“[Revenge]’s delight is murder, and its end is despair”  
-Friederich Schiller-_

* * *

 

They’d figured out a system, for university. They were a little more than three years through, now, so they’d gotten very good at it.

All four of them had gone to the same place- the Imperial College at Kharad, mostly to make their parents happy, and because the Imperial University system had the best medical program, and it wasn’t going to hurt the rest of them to let Sebastian have what he wanted for that, not when it got them away from their parents and kept them all together.

The system was this:

The Jagdsprinz’s trust level of them existed somewhere between _‘would do witchcraft with the right rationale’_ and _‘flagrant disregard for own safety’_ ; so, for university, they’d all been bunched together so it would be easier to keep an eye on them.

“Do we _really_ need bodyguards?”Maria had complained.

Her _Elti_ had frowned fiercely at her and reminded her that the _last_ time the four of them had been left alone together at school, they had _“rearranged Nadri’s **soul,** ” _so yes they _did_ need bodyguards.

The flaw in this plan was that the only person the Jagdsprinz totally trusted to keep an eye on them, but who could also be spared for the job, was Emma Miccichelo, who still worked at her best with Rosario Allard and Domdruc Filfaraskind.

So that was three guards for four people, and since Reno was considered the most responsible and least likely to get in trouble of all of them, he was usually left alone. It also helped that Kharad was the capital of Freiezuno, so that meant _Ravenna_ was here, and general consensus between their bodyguards was that he wasn’t going to get into the _magical_ sort of trouble around her.

But they all covered for each other, so that if, say, Maria wanted to go out to the Shining City, or Nadri felt like she was going to _bite_ Domdruc if he shadowed her excursions in lion form _again,_ or Sebastian had some theorizing and research he wanted to do without his _Elti_ getting worked up about it when Emma reported back to her, the other three would go do something that absolutely _required_ the presence of one or more of the bodyguards. Whoever was being covered for would fake doing something that didn’t need supervision until everyone else had left, and then sneak away or do whatever they really wanted to be doing.

Today, though, no one needed covering; and Maria and Sebastian were out at the workshops because Maria had some sort of project to do with the sword her _Elti_ had given her while Nadri prowled around campus, chasing rabbits on foot to relieve some boredom. Nadri wasn’t really interested in university, and had only come along because it was expected- Reno thought it was a bit of a shame that she wasn’t interested in joining the Hunt, because it was probably the only place she’d be able to fight people legally.

He was considering convincing her and Maria to travel together, once Maria had her degree and had mirrored Sebastian’s ten years of graduate and post-graduate work to become an actual, certified doctor first in the _Großjagdsreich_ ’s naval officer’s academy, followed by doing her minimum service to fleet- her parents’ conditions for allowing her to go running around in unexplored space. Maria would probably see a lot of interesting and exciting places, potentially full of danger- and Nadri _liked_ danger.   

That was for the future, though. Right now, Reno was more worried about himself and Ravenna, because there was a ring burning a hole in his desk drawer and two weeks of Freiezuno political coverage of the Imperials and the Republicans’ latest, but could-actually-work-this-time, attempt to make up. The proposal was to drop most of the rest of the trade and travel restrictions across the border, and properly hook up the Republicans’ old discreet planetary Internets into the Empire’s galactic network, so they could actually share information and news and communications _properly_ again.

It was a big political change, but it would be good for the galaxy as long as no one messed it up. The problem was that it might not be _that_ great of a deal for Freiezuno, as the biggest port for the restricted traffic flow between the Empire and the Republic. They’d bleed money to other planets if the border opened up, and people were screaming about it all over the news.

At least, though, there was coverage for the people who were also pointing out that there was a lot to be said for being _established_ as a port planet, and having the proper facilities and organizations in place, already known to people traveling and with business contacts on both sides of the border. The main point in the business argument was that HabèTech’s headquarters had been in Kharad since basically the end of the War of the Republican Succession, since they basically _had_ to continue selling to the whole galaxy- HabèTech wasn’t about to pack up and leave after spending a few centuries here, and worming their way into the power structures and extremely favorable deals about taxes and tariff rates.

Reno’s best plan- his _only_ plan, actually, but that didn’t stop it from being the _best-_ was to pitch the idea that Ravenna being married to him was not only an honest-to-God fairytale romance, but a good business deal. He was Princess of Póli Thálassas, after all, and one day to be Empress, and Ravenna’s parents were already friends with the Jagdsprinz and the Jagdsprinz and his _Mamma_ had been getting along a lot better than they had before, and an unofficial family alliance with Venice, and a second one with Honlaee through Póli Thálassas rather than the Jägerskov and peripherally the Silent Hills, would definitely be in Freiezuno’s interest. Venice’s state-owned merchant marine was the biggest single carrier of goods, even if they weren’t carrying the most _expensive_ things or had a corner on the market- it the private Venetian companies that got anywhere, and had the biggest market share when taken collectively.

Aligning with Venice in the face of an end to technical primacy in cross-border trade would be good business sense. If he and Ravenna and Ravenna’s parents let the news media and the politicians chew on _that_ for a while, then hopefully it would calm things down.

If it didn’t, really… well, he and Ravenna were going to married, anyway. They’d elope, if they had to. They’d already talked about it. Giving her the ring would just be making it official for everyone else.

But he still worried about it, because he was a worrisome person. He was used to having to leave time for this sort of thing, even if it wasn’t pleasant.

_Fairytale romance,_ he reminded himself. _Media likes that sort of thing._

Fairytale romance…

It had been. Theirs was a case of love at first sight, statistically unlikely but possible. They’d gone from the six-to-nine months of honeymoon phase straight to _‘meant for each other’_ and _‘ **so** married’, _and neither of them were about to give that up.  

He stared blankly at the wall of his room, an idea forming between snippets of lecture from the classes he’d taken for his literature degree and the basic plot elements of countless stories he’d read, or heard.

Well- would it _hurt?_ If it didn’t work, it didn’t work; but if it did it could be the bit of edge that they needed, the luck to get them through an engagement and public marriage without messing up politics for the next five years or so.

Reno got out a blank sheet of paper, a hard-lead drafting pencil, and his good pens.

Stories didn’t have to be magical to be powerful; but there was no reason you _couldn’t_ make them magical. They had a definite structure, and structure was the basis of ritual magic and really every other sort of magic, once you got down to it, and accepted that each person’s different affinities worked as their own individual systemic structure.

He’d theorized about it, of course, a lot- both in private and with Nadri and Maria and Sebastian, but mostly with Sebastian, because Nadri would listen because she loved him but she didn’t care about magic now that she had what she wanted, and Maria’s interest in magic had two settings: very concrete and technical technomancy, and the kind of terrifying metaphysical stuff she got up to at the end of the universe. Sebastian like theorizing about magic, any sort, and stories were the sort of grey-area between _‘magic’_ and _‘people’_ that he got all excited about with blood magic and soul magic.

Just because he hadn’t actually tried to apply the theories before didn’t mean they couldn’t work. And he wouldn’t know until he tried.

So- ritual magic, affinities. How did you do affinities with stories?

The basic starting point with affinities was usually your cultural background. He wanted magic for this story, and so it felt right to go the Thálassian oral tradition.

Reno carefully penciled down: _‘Let me tell you the story of_ ,’ the Thálassian version of _‘Once upon a time,’_ while he thought about how he wanted this to go.

It should be simple, not too complicated- all he wanted was to get married, with a minimum of fuss. But it should stay somewhat realistic, both to how things already were and how they were likely to fall out, to keep things from looking incredibly suspicious, or using up a lot more magic than was really necessary. If he kept it formulaic, as well, and as general as he could, it would likely be easier to treat it as a sort of ritual, a pattern- _‘two people fall in love, have an obstacle to being together, but are able to overcome it’_ was a very, very old story, after all.

This was going to need a delicate balance.

* * *

_Let me tell you the story of the princess and the lady-love, in a world of five empires._

_The lady-love was heir to a kingdom that lay between two more powerful empires, who had long been enemies. Her own parents’ marriage had been the cause of some scandal, for her father had been an advisor to the ruler of the third empire; but neither could have stood to marry another. She was her parents’ daughter, and was equally determined to marry one who would love her as her parents loved each other._

_The princess was heir to the fourth empire, powerful in business and politics. He had grown up knowing his parents’ marriage was less than ideal, and the cause of much grief and heartbreak and anger, and wished to do better._

_The two met and knew at once that they were meant to marry each other, despite what problems were sure to await them with the confluence of family and politics. There was much outcry at the idea, but the lady-love’s kingdom was threatened by hard times, hard times that the princess’s empire could help them through. Once this had been explained, the outcry quieted, and the two were able to marry, and live happily ever after._

* * *

Sergeant Damir Beilschmidt had lived almost thirteen years in Kharad, now, and his knowledge of the city had given him the perfect place to meet with his mother.

It had to be discreet, even beyond the fact that this was a personal talk, because Generalleutnant Mäelle Beilschmidt was the commanding officer of the Hunt’s Intelligence Special Operations, and her presence anywhere but Martinach or in the company of the Jagdsprinz herself was immediately a cause for suspicion and alarm.

To anyone who saw them together and reported it, it wouldn’t matter that they were mother and son- it would turn up in government reports and flagged in intelligence files across the galaxy as the Generalleutnant of the Hunt’s Intelligence Special Operations Division meeting with the Sergeant of the Kharad Police Department’s NCO Witchbreaker Auxiliaries, who had just semi-closed a very nasty case where a renegade sorcerer had been killing people to stitch together select parts from her victims to make a new body, and then attach her soul to it.

Never mind that NCO Witchbreaker Auxiliaries the Empire over were the complicated child of the interplay between the Imperial Human State’s police-army-intelligence conglomeration and the Hunt’s dual status as _‘law enforcement’_ and _‘foreign power’_. The compromise was police Investigators under Hunt NCOs- a Captain and a Sergeant, non-commissioned in the sense that they weren’t actually Jäger, and so couldn’t be called to Hunt or held the Jagdsprinz as their King, but still _acted_ for the Hunt- who had at least partial authority in any case where magic had been used for the misdeed. The _actual_ Witchbreakers, the full Jäger, _they_ got called in once someone had committed witchcraft, and the police had to step aside for that.

As Damir’s late squad sorcerer, killed when they’d gone after the renegade, had put it about that case: _“It’s not **actually** necromancy if she’s not trying to **raise** the people she’s killed, and she knows it. We can’t call the Witchbreakers, they wouldn’t have authority. This is just magically-motivated murder.”_

But if it looked like Intelligence Special Operations might have even a _hint_ of interest in the case, then the whole thing was going to blow up again, and there’d be conspiracy theorists popping out from everywhere, and people would actually start _listening_ to them probably, and it would be a nightmare.

Hence, a private upstairs room in the restaurant-café his immediate superior and husband, Captain Hendga Liukasiewicz, brought him to when they wanted some time to be out in public not on the job, but also not expected to play up their family lineages. The staff was very good at being discreet, which was how they kept the two of them coming back.

To Damir’s mind, it was a better spot to have a meeting you didn’t want anyone else knowing about than any of the designated political/society establishments in the city- and Kharad had a lot of them. He’d never understood how people managed not to run into the people they were trying to avoid, getting in and out of those places, since they all catered to the same limited pool of clientele.

His mother arrived exactly on time, as always, shown in by one of the upstairs waiters, who took their drinks order at the same time.

“I know things like this can be hard, Damir,” she told him once the waiter had left. “Are you all right?”

 Damir sighed.

“Rika is dead and Odau is still in the hospital, and Shakti is partially tied up at _least_ until Medeas is allowed to walk around for long periods again, since they have to be helped out with the wheelchair and xe’s married to them, so not that great actually. Aaliyah and Zannah and I are the only ones who can go out and do fieldwork, since Hengda is still trying to manage all his paperwork. _And_ we’re almost certain that that sorcerer had people working for her to do most of the actual murdering, and we haven’t caught them yet. You know how it is- as much separation as possible, trying to keep deniability for everyone in the process.”

“It’s a pain,” his mother agreed. “I wish criminals hadn’t caught on to the loopholes in the Hunt’s power. Is it enough to- have you been thinking about leaving, again?”

The NCO Witchbreaker Auxiliary had never been Damir’s first choice for a career. He could handle the commanding part just fine, and he didn’t mind the administrative stuff, but the actual dealing with crime and apprehending criminals part made him nauseous. He _hated_ physical danger.  

But he’d _tried_ doing other things, and the public pressure was always on about what the Hunt’s strategy was with this, when was he finally going to embrace his family’s legacy, and so on. Damir didn’t _want_ to be in the Hunt, but he didn’t want to give up his life and take a new identity to get away from it all, and so the Auxiliary was a capitulation enough to being _‘in’_ the Hunt without _actually_ being in the Hunt that it shut everyone up.

And he got to spend basically the whole day with his husband, too, so that had worked out all right.

“It would be kind of awkward, at this point,” Damir told her. “And I can’t leave my people when they’re like this, anyway. But I didn’t want to talk about the sorcerer.”

“Oh?” his mother asked.

“Hengda and I already talked about it,” he said. “Because this has kind of been a thing for a while but we’d managed to keep it quiet so well that we didn’t want to say anything until we were sure about this, and, well-”

_“Damir.”_

“Hengda and I are adding someone else to the marriage,” he said. “From the squad.”

“Well, I’m happy for all of you,” his mother told him. “And I’m glad I got notice about before receiving an invitation to the ceremony; but besides confirming that your squad has won the award for _‘Closest compliance to the ‘everyone in the Auxiliary are married to each other’ stereotype’,_ that’s not necessarily something to be so cagey about.”

“It’s Zannah Brahe,” Damir said.

“…Oh.”

“I know it’s a complication,” he said quickly. “ _We_ know it is. But we’re doing it anyway and you should know, officially, because someone might make a deal out of it and Zannah’s done the best she can to leave it all behind her but a brush with the Hunt isn’t something you can just _shake off,_ so probably tell _Tante-_ ”

The Jagdsprinz was _‘Tante’_ to all of the descendants of her siblings who’s parts of the family had actually stayed close, or in contact, no matter their degree of relation. The situation had gotten more complicated about the time he was born, because now she and Venice were in sort-of competition for the position of unofficial family patriarch.

“-if you think she should know, officially, for PR purposes or something.”

His mother shook her head, and sighed.

“You two certainly don’t make things easy for yourself,” she said. “This isn’t an offense to Zannah or me casting implications on her character, mind; but could I ask Emma to come around to your offices in a few days to check her out? Strictly for official purposes.”

Damir made a face at her.

“Emma Miccichelo is _terrifying,_ mother,” he said. “Couldn’t you ask Rosario instead?”

“If we can say I sent Emma,” she pointed out. “That’s name-recognition and reputation beyond the authority she has as one of my seconds-in-command. Rosario might also be good at his job, and also family, but he’s not Emma Miccichelo.”

“If you really _have_ to.”

“I think I really do,” she told him. “Zannah should know she signed up for this, marrying into the pair of you, anyway. Any children the three of you have are going to be related to every Nation who ever had children through blood, marriage, or adoption- if she can’t handle Emma, she’s definitely not going to be able to handle the _rest_ of the family.”

* * *

The Mages’ Market community center was a little taste of home, here on Freiezuno, even though it wasn’t really a lot like home at all.

It was a bastion of Honalenier sensibility in the midst of a bunch of humans, though, so Sebastian was reasonably confident that Maria would be able to convince their bodyguards to continue to allow her to rent workshop space here, so _they_ could feel more at home, as well. As per usual, it was Domdruc who was _‘watching’_ them- though they’d managed to spend five years without doing anything really magically important, at least that anyone had caught them at, and so the supervision was a lot more lax now than it had been.

Sebastian mostly just came along with Maria to keep her company, though today there was a better reason.

Back just before they’d helped Nadri, their _Elti_ had given them her grandfathers’ swords- Hrotti, to him, and Ridill, to Maria. They’d been trained somewhat and they both thought it was pretty pointless and ridiculous exercise- sure, so they could hit someone with a sword, but even most Jäger didn’t carry those around, any longer- but they’d kept with it to keep _Elti_ happy, and gotten some much more applicable defensive hand-to-hand, and at the start of coming to Kharad, they’d managed to convince Emma and Domdruc to give them knife-fighting lessons.

It had been Maria’s idea, and _Elti_ had approved since she was planning to be off on her own for decades a time, in space, maybe meeting who _knew_ what people. Just because their galaxy had been wiped clean of alien life by the Pict didn’t mean that they’d gotten _everywhere,_ and that she wouldn’t possibly meet new civilizations and maybe have to defend herself. Sebastian had come along on the basis that _Elti_ wasn’t totally wrong about the four of them needing to know some self-defense, just in case- swords had just been the wrong way to do it.

Maria had solved the sword problem by shrinking Hrotti down to knife-size, and redoing the hilt so no one would notice that she’d managed to do some very serious magic. Transformation was something Sebastian was pretty sure even General Agresta and Sorcerer Héderváry had never done. It was a high theory proposition, and it took an awful lot of power, enough that it took the sort of magic a _Razanás_ or a full _Seelenkind_ could muster on a regular basis to make work. Mostly, it just wasn’t worth it.

But these were heirlooms, of a sort; and _Elti_ did occasionally ask if they’d been using them, and it was nice to be able to say they had. They were a lot more convenient this size, anyhow.

The new hilt Maria had made for his _‘knife’_ was antler, and he’d been pretty surprised, actually, that she knew how to re-hilt a blade. Apparently, she’d just looked it up and then proceeded very carefully.

Ridill’s re-hilting should have been finished right now, except for a problem.

“It’s been magicked,” Maria had told him, before they’d made the plans to come. “This was Germania’s sword and I know the story is that Erlkönig magicked it for him, so he could actually _kill_ Rome, but I think maybe he forgot to take it off. I don’t want to be carrying around a King-killer.”

She also hadn’t wanted to shrink it down with that sort of magic still attached to the sword, so Sebastian had been asked along to get rid of it. It was simple enough to sit down in a chair with his back to Domdruc while Maria set up the distraction project, which she’d work on until Domdruc temporarily wandered off to go find some other Honalenier, or any Honalenier-raised fey sorcerers who might be hanging around, and step out of his body to take a look at the magic that had been put on the sword.

It was a complex thing, and Sebastian sat his shadow-self down on the floor of the workshop, the… it felt strange to call it the _soul_ of the sword, but there wasn’t really a better word for it, so the soul of the sword across his knees and picked it apart.

He did it slowly, so he could commit it to memory enough to write it down later, and by the time he was finished and came back to himself, Domdruc had been gone for a little bit already.

Maria snatched the sword up as soon as he opened his eyes again, so she could get to work shrinking it. She’d snuck it into the workshop hidden in the distraction project, unwilling to risk Sebastian taking the magic off elsewhere and possibly alerting everyone else around that something big, magically, had happened. There was enough magic concentrated around the workshops that some spikes wouldn’t go amiss.

Ridill was down to knife-size and she’d put him to polishing the thin silver inlay wire she was going to use for the design, and Maria was sawing off the old hilt, when Domdruc came back.

“Finished?” he asked, noting the new project.

“Taking a break,” Maria told him. A large chunk of the old hilt hit the floor with a clatter.

They were there most of the rest of the day- Maria was working in rowan for the new hilt, and did the rough shaping and cut in the paths for the wire inlay. It was going to be a constellation- one of the ones she could see from the Shining City- so they’d have to come back another day to stain the wood black and then do the inlays. 

* * *

Buana Tolvaj was a new graduate of the police academy, and by rights that meant, as a sorcerer graduate, that he should be off in a starting-level position in some forensics lab somewhere, or working with supply, or, if he was lucky, doing security sweeps with the canine units and electronic sniffers.

Instead, he was- as his grandmother would have put it- _‘cursed with luck’_. He’d done well practically and academically, and his instructors had liked him, and he was from a middling-sized town on Zeshan that had also just so happened to send a fervently home-happy resident to the Federal Congress and then in her old age on to the Imperial Congress, and so he’d ended up with _political patronage._

Buana did not want political patronage. He wanted to be back on Zeshan, maybe in the capital, checking international traffic for contraband.

He’d wanted _traffic duty,_ but instead strings had been pulled without him knowing and he’d been presented with a ticket to Kharad, a folder of housing suggestions and basic cultural information, and informed that he’d been _‘promoted on merit’-_

_Ha!_

-and in extraordinary circumstances, to Sorcery Officer in the Kharad NCO Witchbreaker Auxiliary.

He’d called home in panicked tears after getting the news, and screeched hysterically at his grandmother for a full fifteen minutes about the news.

“They _said_ it’s because I’m fey and most of the fey nowadays go straight into technomancy or they sign on as Hunt NCOs or they go to Honalee or the _Großjagdsreich_ if they’re not wandering sorcerers and do non-magic jobs so I’m one of the most powerful they’ve got and Kharad could really use me right now but they had _Rika Steen_ before me she taught at the academy before they pulled _her_ to replace the Kharad Auxiliary’s sorcerer before _her_ but _he_ only retired _she_ was killed on the job _they’re_ the ones doing that Frankenstein-sorcerer case that’s been all over the news and I’m only _just_ out the academy _I can’t handle this!_ ”

“Buana,” his grandmother had said, once he’d repeated himself for the third or fourth time. “Even if it is because of that woman in the Imperial Senate, it would not have been approved unless they thought you _could_ handle it. You graduated with top scores, and the only thing you do _not_ have in abundance is practical experience. You will go, you will do well, and eventually you will think you overreacted.”

It was his first day on the job and he still didn’t think he was overreacting. He’d found the squad roster in his folder, and had been staring at it glumly.

His NCOs were Hengda _Liukasiewicz,_ and Damir _Beilschmidt._ This was entirely too much. He wasn’t from a political family and he was a greenhorn officer- people like him weren’t supposed to meet people like _them_ right off on the job.

The other names- Medeas and Shakti Taymuraz, Aaliyah Gaylord, Odau Ninomis, and Zannah Brahe- at least, didn’t sound familiar; though _‘Zannah’_ was bugging him for some reason. Had he had a classmate called _‘Zannah’_ at some point? It wasn’t a very common name-

Buana was partway up the steps of the precinct office the Auxiliary worked out of when he figured it out. _‘Zannah’_ was a Honalenier name- Buyanov, so it sounded familiar because he’d had to learn some of that as part of the training at the academy.

Well, Honalenier he could handle.

The officer on desk duty didn’t seem to quite believe him when he said he was the Auxiliary’s new Sorcery Officer, could you please tell me where their bullpen is? but gave him directions anyway, probably assuming that, if he was lying or playing a prank, the NCOs could do their own scolding.

Witchbreaker Auxiliaries always had their own bullpen, the large open room with non-cubicled desks for easy teamwork, separate from the rest of the officers. Usually, they were right across the hall from each other, but in Kharad evidently something about the building had made it so they were down the hall and around a corner.

It seemed pretty empty to Buana, when he walked in, but then he noticed movement behind the half-wall of frosted glass on the other side of the room. It looked like this bullpen was in the standard layout- there were the case boards mounted on the walls in the corner of the room to the left, walking in the door, and two benches for visitors and witnesses to be questioned on the right, and then beyond that the clear glass of the Captain’s office in that corner. Following the layout meant that the clunky-looking desk in the alcove the protruding office made belonged to the Sergeant, and so that made the far wall the squad meeting room.

He walked across the bullpen to knock on the closed door. It was opened immediately by a quite tall, absolutely _beautiful_ woman with a long flow of dark hair.

“I’m Buana, uh, Sorcerer Tolvaj, the new Sorcery Officer?” he said. “I’ve got the assignment papers if you need proof, uh-”

“Investigator Brahe,” the woman said. “Zannah, Buana. Nice to meet you, we’ve just been waiting for you to show up.”

There were a couple of empty seats at the tale that he could see, when she stepped aside to let him in. Part of that would be because it was meant to sit ten people but Witchbreaker Auxiliaries were only eight at full staff- the two NCOs, the Sorcery Officer, and the five Investigators- but the other part of that would be that the old Sorcery Officer was _dead,_ and he knew from the news reports and from his assignment papers that one of the Investigators was still in the hospital, and probably wouldn’t be leaving soon.

The man standing up front with the black hair and the dark green eyes must be Captain Liukasiewicz, he decided; because the glum-looking dirty blonde sitting at the table closest to him had _‘Beilschmidt’_ written on his flap-tab patch, so that was the Sergeant.

Zannah Brahe solved his most pressing problem by sitting down directly across from Sergeant Beilschmidt. Usually, that was the place of the Sorcery Officer; but Buana was new and he wasn’t about to try to get familiar with the NCOs, and was just as happy to scurry down closer to the further end of the table, and put the Investigator in the wheelchair between himself and them.

“We’ll have to have introductions, then, before we get to announcements,” Captain Liukasiewicz said, and started them off. “Hengda Liukasiewicz, Captain, he.”

Zannah picked up from him.

“Zannah Brahe, Investigator and backup, she.”

He wasn’t that surprised to find out that Zannah was his backup- the Investigator with the most skill at magic besides the official Sorcery Officer. It wasn’t an official position, but it was generally considered a good idea to have someone designated for the role, just in case-

Well, in case something like what had happened to Sorcery Officer Rika Steen happened. Buana felt slightly more secure in the realization that Zannah had therefore faced down the Frankenstein sorcerer, and seemed to have walked away unharmed.

“Medeas Taymuraz, Investigator, they,” the officer in the wheelchair next to him said.

“Buana Tolvaj,” Buana said, trying not to let his voice squeak. “Sorcery Officer, he; uh, I, I don’t know if this is where I bring it up or not but I’m just out of the academy-”

“We can tell, kid,” Captain Liukasiewicz told him, but it wasn’t unkind, and he didn’t seem unhappy or disappointed about that. It did sting a little, though, to know that he was being so obvious. “Don’t worry, we can handle it.”

“Shakti Taymuraz, Investigator, xe,” was next around the table, seated on the other side; next to “Aaliyah Gaylord, also Investigator, she.”

“Damir Beilschmidt,” their Sergeant sighed. “Sergeant, he.”

“Well, we’ve got some big news for this week,” Captain Liukasiewicz said. “And it’s not just Buana turning up- Damir and I are happy to say that we’re adding Zannah to our marriage, though unfortunately that means Damir’s mother is making Emma Miccichelo come over for a couple of hours on Thursday to, well, vet us I guess. So no one panic when she shows up, and wear something nice on Thursday.”

 His first day and half the squad was getting _married_ and _Emma Miccichelo_ was coming later this week.

Maybe he’d get lucky, and strain of a new environment and the stress of a new job would make him get debilitating ill.

* * *

“Kelsie!” Maria called, stepping off the stardust bridge to set foot in the Shining City. “Hey Kelsie!”

Her friend appeared, in that silent way of theirs. It seemed like someone that big, and especially with wings like that, should have made more noise, but Kelsie was good at this.

“Look!” she said, unsheathing her _‘knife’_ to show it off.

“Oh!” Kelsie exclaimed, examining the new hilt. She’d gotten it stained and inlaid and glued together only a few days previously. “You finished it!”

“Not quite yet,” Maria said. “I haven’t sealed it yet, and there’s not really a good grip on the hilt. But I brought some roughed leather to fix that.”

“But you’ll cover up all the work you’ve done!” they protested.

“No, I’ve got an idea,” she said. “Come on, I have to use the workshop here to do it, or else Emma would get all suspicious.”

Kelsie followed her to the house she’d claimed for her own use, since no one else lived here. She’d had a room cleaned out and set up as a workshop some years ago, soon after helping Nadri, so that she could do bigger or more powerful or more complex magic without having to be _watched_ all the time. It wasn’t as well-equipped as she would have liked, so she did still have to use workshops closer to home, but it had everything she needed for this bit.

“I’m going to fuse the leather with the wood,” Maria explained to Kelsie, setting up. “So there’s a grip, but there’s still the inlays. It will be _sort_ of wood, still, though so I’m going to have to seal it. That’s going to be the fun part.”

“The fun part?”

“Yeah,” she said, wrapping the hilt. “You’ll see.”

The hardest part of fusing the leather and the rowan wood was making sure the inlay was still on top. That didn’t mean it was particularly easy to make the wood and the leather into one thing, each taking on components of the other until they were totally indistinguishable and it wasn’t clear what exactly the material she’d used was; but the inlay bit was definitely harder. She hadn’t been certain she could inlay it after the fusing, though, so she’d left it for second-to-last.

“So, the fun part,” she said, once she’d gotten the fusing finished and taken a break. “Is that I’m going to put some stardust into the sealant, so it looks a little more like actual space. It’ll be cool.”

“You’re going to add magic to it, then?” Kelsie asked.

“No, it doesn’t need it,” Maria said. “I don’t actually ever plan on stabbing anyone with it, and I’m not a fighter, so there’s no point. I just want it to look nice, so I can wear it around without looking like I _expect_ to have to fight somebody.”

Mixing the stardust in with the sealant was delicate work, because she didn’t want to add too much and overwhelm what she’d already done, but she didn’t want to add too little and not be able to see it. Eventually, after some experimenting on wax paper with trying to sprinkle it in, and blow it in, she asked Kelsie for a molted feather and brushed it onto a coat of sealant she’d already applied. Once this dried, she’d put another over it, to keep the stardust from flaking off.

“It’ll be a bit to dry,” she said to her friend. “Flying?”

Kelsie grinned. This was their favorite part of Maria visiting, and usually one of Maria’s as well. Kelsie usually spent their time out flying, exploring the dust and gas clouds and the stars, and they liked showing off what they’d found.

“I saw a comet yesterday,” they offered. “Bet I could find it again.”

“Bet I can get there first!”

It was fun, racing Kelsie. No one else she knew would have been able to beat her to a specified place, since she _always_ knew where everything was; but sometimes Kelsie could.

Today, they did, and was sitting quite happily on top of the comet when Maria caught up. She clambered up next to them and dipped her hand into the comet’s trail, the ice grains going to water against her skin.

She picked up a coating of stardust, too, and opened the pouch of it she always kept with her to brush it off into what she already had. The pouch was another secret she kept, as part of the Shining City- Maria was just happy that the lining of the thing had been treated to dampen magic. You couldn’t feel a thing from it when it was closed, and so no one else had ever sensed it or found it on her.

“Reno’s doing something interesting,” she offered. Kelsie could show her new things and new places; but what she had to offer them was news about what was going on in other places, where there were actually _people._ “Sebastian says that he finally decided to do a practical experiment with the story magic thing he’s been theorizing, since he and Ravenna are going to announce that they’re engaged and they could use some luck to get through it. He wrote them a happy ending, so we’re waiting to see how it turns out.”

“Do you think it will work?” Kelsie asked.

Maria shrugged.

“I don’t see why it wouldn’t,” she said. “We’ve always been able to do pretty strange and powerful stuff before, especially when we all got together to help Nadri. And I hope it works for them, anyway. They’re really in love. It’ll probably be a long engagement, since they’re both still in school, so they probably won’t get _actually_ married for a while, but I think for a wedding present I’ll bring them both here. I think Ravenna would like it.”

“ _I’d_ like to meet her,” Kelsie said. “We could show her the Rainbow Nebula!”

“I think she would like that,” Maria agreed. “And- hey, what do you think about me donating some stardust for her dress- or their dresses, Reno might decide to wear one too, he likes them enough. Imagine it all sparkling on white cloth- I think it would look really beautiful. Like diamonds, but better.”

* * *

Going to do an interrogation was an okay break from babysitting, though Mäelle had made it very clear that this was _not_ an interrogation, this was mostly a show visit, she was supposed to go see them, hang out for maybe ten minutes, and then leave.

That sounded really boring, so Emma was going to keep calling it an interrogation in her head.

She loved being Jäger, and she loved being the most-experienced member of the Intelligence Special Operations division. It had worked out really well for her, because she’d managed to avoid a promotion to Generalleutnant, which meant _paperwork_ and a _desk job,_ and gotten Mäelle kicked up above her on the basis that she and General Beilschmidt were already used to coordinating things and working together, and Martinach’s intelligence agency really should have a non-Jager handling it.

She’d gotten to stay _‘Leutnant Miccichelo’_ ; but unfortunately the non-promotion she’d worked for so she could keep doing fieldwork meant that she was available- and perfectly placed, even, in Freiezuno- to babysit.

It was extremely boring. She was being paid to follow some _kids_ around and make sure they didn’t blow themselves up, and so had to take reports from _other people_ instead of doing the work herself.

Emma would have liked to pass of babysitting duty to some junior _Großjagdsreich_ naval officers or something, but, as her _Bisnonno_ had told her more than once over the course of this assignment, the Jagdsprinz was little paranoid about the safety of her family, and there was actually a good reason to keep an eye on them so they could be headed off in case they were about to do something actually illegal.

But couldn’t the Jagdsprinz have hired _Edward_ to do it? He’d quit his job with Governor Saab to teach the four of them, after all, and then ended up passing them all off to his relatives. He’d even come back to Freiezuno! His brother Verity was here working for HabèTech still and Vasco Agresta hadn’t stopped being stationed here as Oberleutnant for the regional detachment of the Zauberen Regiment and Intelligence and Internal Affairs had _undeniable proof_ that Edward and Vasco were secretly dating so _why was she stuck with this job?_

She really needed to figure out a way to ask for reassignment. There had been an opportunity, two years ago, when as part of the pre-Reconciliation Treaty proposal overtures between the Republican Confederacy and the Imperial State, the Hunt had sent in some Special Operations officers to take a look around. The Republican Confederacy had been her first real assignment! It had started Special Operations in the first place! She could have gone- she could have done it!

Emma had a suspicion, though, that if she’d tried to volunteer someone would have handed down one of the unofficial regulations that acted as the guidelines for the functioning of the Hunt: _‘Senior officers will allow the junior ones opportunities to prove themselves’_.

That was one of things the Hunt had to balance, she knew, but sometimes it was frustrating to step aside and let the younger Jäger- three hundred, four hundred years younger than you, who’d never known a world without easy space travel and multiple settled planets and people not taking monarchy seriously; and sometimes even _five hundred_ or _six hundred_ years younger, the newest commissioned officers promoted out of the NCO ranks in the Witchbreaker Auxiliaries, or the _Großjagdsreichser_ or the Imperial or the Venetian justice system.

Emma had actually been at the meeting that led to the recruitment out of the NCOs, with the Jagdsprinz, since General Beilschmidt had claimed the issues as _‘Internal Affairs’_ and pulled the eldest human and _Seelenkind_ Jäger to back him up in front of his _Elti._

“There’s a lot to say for _‘higher duty’_ ,” had been the core of the argument. Arik had actually given it to Mosè to present, and Marschall Braginski had sort of loomed in the background as he spoke, arms crossed. “But, Jagdsprinz- _Tante-_ being Jäger is, in a strictly mundane sense, a change of legal status. There are certain rights and privileges you get from being Jäger- the right to have any charges against you tried by the Hunt and yourself, rather than the legal systems of the accusing party, the privilege of near-immortality, and of course Jäger are totally provided for by the Hunt on top of discretionary pay.”

“It’s social status, too,” Untermarschall Agresta had picked up from him. “Being Jäger, and not just in Honalee any longer. It has been for a while and you know it. I _also_ know that you know that we’ve had career NCOs in the Imperial State in the Auxiliaries _and_ in the justice system- good people, who would have liked to join the Hunt, and could have been assets, but didn’t get the chance. Sooner or later, people are going to get bitter about being shut out of the power structure.”

“We don’t have _room_ to hire anyone else, Diana, you know there aren’t enough positions-”

“So let people retire, Jagdsprinz.”

Nico Agresta had fake-coughed and then stage-whispered _‘Oligarchy!’_ to Marschall Braginski.

It was amazing how blatant you could be when you had a perfectly valid point and knew the right buttons to push. The Jagdsprinz had made a bunch of frustrated noise about how _‘ **You’re** the ones who kept saying I should be less republican!’ _but- with great relish- put the idea of retirement to the Hunt for the first general majority vote in centuries.

So now, if you’d served as a Jager for three hundred and fifty years, you could ask for an honorable discharge from service. A lot of the human Jäger from the first couple of centuries of the Hunt had decided to take the opportunity, while some of the Honalenier from the same time period sneered privately amongst themselves about their position of moral superiority, because _they_ hadn’t abandoned their duty. It had gotten bad enough that some of the Honalenier Jäger who had also opted for honorable discharge had started getting shunned. 

Arik had asked for her temporary reassignment back to him to handle the _‘Internal Affairs’_ business of the Department rather than the _‘Intelligence’_ part of it; and Emma had gladly squashed the worst of the sneering. It had been especially bad just after the promotions had been handed out- that was where she’d gotten Mäelle kicked up over her to Generalleutnant of Intelligence Special Operations- and the new Jäger had gotten their assignments. Internal Affairs’s rooting around had meant that some senior Jäger got a thorough scare from Marschall Lord Hiruz and Marschall Braginski threatening to drag them up before the Jagdsprinz to be kicked out of the Hunt for their behavior; then _de_ moted, and reassigned to various punishment duties.

Like _babysitting_ felt like.

But you wouldn’t put people who might be bearing a grudge in charge of your children, so that couldn’t have worked, but surely _someone_ else-

_It’s an interrogation,_ Emma reminded herself. _It’s an interrogation even if Mäelle says it isn’t_.

She’d put in a request for Zannah Brahe’s file, and a paper format had been dropped by the internal mail courier the day before. Now, she had it tucked under her arm as she walked in the door of the precinct the Auxiliary had their bullpen in.

The regular police officer on duty made a noise, like they were going to try to stop her. It was part of the job, she knew, and building security was important; but she _was_ in uniform and the Hunt and the police were supposed to be working together.

She detoured just long enough to drop her ID wallet, with its magically-touched gold double stamps of the Hunt’s insignia and the _Großjagdsreich_ ’s coat of arms on the inside of the top flap to serve as a mark of authenticity beyond the chip hidden inside the black leather, onto the desk, and pointed one finger at her Special Operations shoulder patch- a black falcon on a gold background.

This precinct had the standard insignia cheat sheet behind the desk, for both Imperial police-military and Hunt groups and ranks. The duty officer glanced at it, and momentarily froze.

Emma had taken the occasion of _not_ being on babysitting duty to dress to impress, leaving off the stripped-down field duty uniform she and Rosario and Domdruc wore when shadowing the kids in favor of airing out her full dress uniform for the visit. It had felt really good to put on the Hunt’s formal black, instead of spending yet _another_ day in dark grey; and she’d felt better about herself, looking the mirror and seeing the sleeve cuff rank stripes of a Leutnant, and the collar tabs and shoulder patches that denoted her current assignment and her position in the Department of Intelligence and Internal Affairs. It had felt kind of like validation- _yes, I have a terrible assignment right now, but I’m **better** than this._

Pride of place, for her, were the gold cords of the aiguillette that she hadn’t had occasion to wear before. They were new since the instatement of the honorable discharges, and marked her as a _very_ senior and trusted officer, part of High Command with the Marschalls and Generals and the other specialty officers, like Mäelle’s position as technical head of Special Operations and Sorcerer Demyanev’s as Generalleutnant of the Witchbreakers.

The duty officer was sufficiently able to put three and three together- the Special Operations patch, the aiguillette, and a quick glance down at the card in the ID wallet, with her name, pertinent biographical information, and abbreviated details of service- to be suitably awed.

It was supposed to be an _official_ visit, and if Mäelle found out that she’d indulged herself and done a bit of grandstanding, that’s what she’d say.

And Rosario’s comments about the amount of time she’d spent shining her boots could shove it.

“I’m here to see Captain Liukasiewicz and Sergeant Beilschmidt,” Emma told the duty officer, and took her ID wallet back.

The Auxiliary’s bullpen looked like it was in a lull period, when she walked in, but that could have been because they were waiting for her. Certainly they didn’t seem surprised she’d shown up, and the Auxiliary’s _very_ nervous Sorcery Officer told her that the Captain and the Sergeant and Investigator Brahe were already in the meeting room.

“Hey, Damir!” she said to the Sergeant as she walked in, and waved the file at him in greeting. It was sort of weird to see him grown up, and still getting older. Emma still remembered him best as a child, following his mother around in Martigny or Nienrade. She’d last seen him ten years or so ago, and she was used to people still looking the same age when she saw them again years later- but he hadn’t joined the Hunt.

He didn’t seem nearly as happy to see her.

“Hello, Leutnant Miccichelo,” he replied. “What’s that?”

“This?” Emma asked, brandishing the file again as she took a chair. “This is your fiancée’s Intelligence file. I requisitioned it. I can do that.”

“I have an Intelligence file?” Zannah Brahe asked, sounding a little perturbed.

“You have a brush with the Hunt, you get a file,” Emma told her, and flipped it open on the table. The top sheet was general biographical information, starting with _‘Name: Brahe, Zannah’._ “So, you three have a date for the wedding yet?”

“It seemed sort of- premature,” Damir said. “Since you were coming.”

“I’m not here to look for reasons for you _not_ to get married,” she said. “I’m here to look for anything we might have to address, beyond the obvious. Speaking of-”

She looked at Zannah.

“Do you want them here?” she asked. “Because really I’m asking _you_ questions, we already know everything we need to know about those two. They don’t have to stay if you don’t want them too, me visiting them is the cover for me talking to you.”

“What sort of questions?” Zannah asked.

“I’ll take a look through the file and find out,” Emma told her. “I haven’t done it yet, right now I only know what I remember.”

There were a couple of moments of silent communication between the three of them, and then Zannah quietly asked her to-be husbands to leave.

“You really don’t need to be nervous about this,” Emma said, once they’d gone. “Really.”

Zannah smiled shakily at her.

“It’s hard not to be, Leutnant,” she said. “When you’ve shown up fit for a parade inspection.”

“This was just to make myself feel better,” Emma assured her, and pulled out the first pertinent piece of paper in the file- the court record of her name change. “First question: is this a sealed court record?”

“It was when I was a minor,” Zannah told her. “I don’t if it- timed out, or something, though.”

Emma noted that.

“Okay, then- how many people do you know who could connect _‘Zannah Brahe’_ to _‘Zannah Aranheidskind Oliviaev’,_ or _‘Zannah Haynes’_?”

“Damir and Hengda,” she said quietly. “The Jäger and Witchbreakers who came for Olivia Haynes. I don’t know anyone else, but maybe some people who were in the Mages’ Market at the time would remember me.”

“Okay, we’ll make sure to check out Enceladus, then,” Emma said. “Do your mother’s people know?”

“My mother’s dead,” Zannah told her, and pointed at the papers. “It’s in the file. She died on the ship over- there was a fight, with other üldrene, I don’t know what it was about. It wasn’t in the police reports.”

Emma searched for the right papers.

“Father’s people don’t know either, hm?” she remarked, seeing that her father was listed as _‘Buyanov’,_ but without any actual name. “What about the foster people?”

“I was only a baby, they wouldn’t know. Olivia Haynes adopted me.”

“Okay, what about the… recovery center staff?”

Zannah went very pale.

“You- you have those records?”

“Of course we have those records,” Emma told her. “You’d just been cleared on witchcraft, but if there were holes in your memory…”

“You were _spying_ on me.”

“That’s kind of the point,” she said. “It’s the Hunt, Zannah- you’re Domdruc and Honalenier by birth, but Imperial by adoption. It could have been the General doing this, instead.”

“They all have non-disclosure agreements,” Zannah told her, sounding a little shaken- whether about the Hunt having her medical records or the possibility that the General could have gotten them instead, Emma didn’t know. “And there’s doctor-patient privilege, and there should be copies of the formal oath of discretion they had to swear to treat people the Hunt or the police brought in.”

Emma didn’t need to check for those- she’d dealt with the recovery centers enough times to know how they worked.

“Yes, but that’s all about your medical history and why you were there,” Emma told her. “If you stayed in contact with any of them, if you’re friends with any of them, it’s not outside the bounds of their agreements to reveal your former names. That’s legal records, not medical.”

“I left and never wanted to see any of them again,” Zannah said firmly. “They weren’t bad people, or mean, but when I walked out of that center I was leaving my old life behind. They’d be reminders.”

“All right. Next question- should someone get a hold of the details of your unfortunate childhood, would you agree to let the Hunt release your sworn statements attesting to the fact that-”

Emma shuffled the papers around.

“- _‘I have no knowledge of the ways and means by which mental confusion, disruption, befuddlement, clouding, or distress can be affected through magical means; nor the tampering with memories through the same’_ ; and that _‘I shall never put the research my adoptive mother and teacher Olivia Haynes has compiled and/or attempted to put into use on the summoning of, control of, extraction of information from, or making pacts of any kinds with demons; nor shall I share this information in any capacity outside of situations authorized by the Jagdsprinz or otherwise pursuant to the cause of the Hunt and legal justice; nor commit it to record in material, magical, or digital format’_ etcetera and so on?”

“Would you have to share all of it?” Zannah asked faintly.

“We’d ask you again, first,” Emma told her. “It would probably get a call from External Affairs in Martigny, or they could send someone out personally. If it gets to the point where someone has tracked down the old case files and legal records, on the Imperial side, you might even get assigned a Jäger lawyer from Legal, and _they’d_ ask you. We’re not in the business of spreading people’s personal information around if they haven’t done anything wrong- and you haven’t, you just had a shit, abusive teacher of an adoptive parent who exploited the fact you’re full Honalenier. We just _collect_ information.”

* * *

“They’re following the fine family tradition of having relationships that make things more complicated for everyone,” was Nico’s first response to the overview of the topics for this semi-unofficial meeting, and started ticked the examples off on his fingers. “Your parents did it. _I_ did it. _You_ did it. Isolde and Dietrich did it. János _kind_ of did all three times he had kids. _Onkle_ Gilbert and _Zio_ Cris and Israel _definitely_ did it. Mosè and Zorya _would_ do it, if either of them ever _actually_ proposed-”

“We’re taking things slowly,” Mosè said, the picture of calm.

“You’ve been _‘taking things slowly’_ ,” Diana told him. “For something like _six centuries._ ”

“When it would result in that level of family entanglement,” Mosè said. “We both agreed it’s better to take very slowly. We’re already related twice over, with _Nonno_ and Amphitrite, and then _Tante_ Nia and Odette.”

“Well then what’s a _third_ time, with all that?” Nia asked, gone sarcastic with stress.

“- and _Gilberto_ did it **_five_** _times_ ,” Nico finished. “All I’m saying is- I don’t see why we expect anyone in this disaster of a family, when they fall in love, not to make at least a _little_ of a mess of _something._ ”

“This is not a _‘disaster of a family’_ ,” Nia told him.

The look he gave her in return clearly said he wasn’t buying that.

_“It’s gotten better!”_ she insisted hotly, and then switched back to the original topic of conversation. “But couldn’t they at _least_ have not all gotten engaged in _the same week?_ ”

“ _Tante,_ come on,” Mosè said. “You know everything goes wrong all at once.”

“It’s not like Damir and Hengda and Zannah Brahe made an actual announcement out of it,” Diana reminded them all. “And they’re not about to. You know what Damir is like, and he thankfully took our advice and is keeping it very quiet until Reno and Ravenna have blown over- he doesn’t want people trying to sling Zannah’s history around for a political point any more than we do.”

Nia sighed, and went to take her seat back. She’d gotten up to try to pace out her current irritation with the universe, but it hadn’t worked.

To be entirely fair and honest- and that was something she’d been working on for the past couple of decades- she was less worried about Zannah Brahe than she was about Reno and Ravenna, though it would seem that logically it should be the other way around.

Zannah Brahe, whatever her personal history was tainted with, did not have the same apparent potential for sheer thoughtless disaster that her children and half-siblings did. She couldn’t figure out how they could treat something like _rearranging a soul_ as an interesting puzzle they’d worked out, like getting a tricky medical diagnosis right.

She would have said that they just didn’t know how powerful they really were, but she knew that was a lie. They knew _exactly_ how powerful they were, which was why they’d gone and magicked Nadri like they had in the first place.

At least Reno seemed to have some sort of sense of scale, and _responsibility._

“Emma said her talk with Zannah Brahe went well,” she told the rest of them, so everyone would be up-to-date on their information. “And it’s been passed off under security clearance to External Affairs, for the PR people to draw up action plans for, just in case. What we _really_ need to talk about is the Reconciliation Treaty.”

“They’re still fighting about the wording in the section concerning jurisdiction in border crossings and other liminal spaces,” Mosè informed them. “Kalananka should be able to talk things around by the end of the week, but then it’s over to _us._ The Republicans are used to the Oversight Commissions, still- they don’t want anything like the integration we have with the Imperials.”

“I still don’t see how they think they’re going to work around it,” Odette said. “We _know_ that they have problems with policing the Mages’ Markets. They’ve come to use for help about it often enough.”

“If they won’t accept police integration, would they accept something like the Witchbreaker Auxiliary?” Diana asked.

“They’ve got their own police sorcerers,” Nia reminded her.

“Yes, but they have to draft them,” Diana pointed out. “They don’t have enough magic-users since there are still travel restrictions in place, so Honalenier and fey don’t usually end up out there unless they’re technomancers.”

“Or Jäger,” Nico said.

“But then they’re _Großjagdsreich_ citizens, and can’t be drafted. The incentives for getting pregnant with fey children over there are outlandish. It’s not in the favor of this treaty to go around portraying it as human trafficking- but it _does_ get awfully close, sometimes. They just can’t get enough technomancers and police sorcerers _without_ basically paying people to get pregnant with fey babies, and then conscripting them all when they grow up.”

“We can’t counter it with saying that they’re not paying, or forcing, the mothers to abandon them to the state, though,” Mosè argued. “It hasn’t been proved they’re _not-_ it might only be some planets, or some administrations, if it’s going on, and all we have is evidence that points to it not being official Confederacy policy.”

“We’re not going to argue about what the Republicans might or might not be doing to make sure they have a base of magic-using citizens to keep their infrastructure intact,” Nia told them, to get the conversation back on track. “We need to have a proposal for sections in the treaty that let us do policing for witches. The Tripartite Treaty wasn’t set up to handle political divisions _within_ the signature Parties, but if we have to go all the way back to it for a foundation, I _will_ make you.”

  “That’s why I’m saying it should be something like the Witchbreaker Auxiliary,” Diana said. “It’s completely out of the question for the Republicans to accept having the Imperial and federal judge and lawyer positions all be Hunt NCOs, but there’s no good reason that they shouldn’t accept Jäger, or Hunt NCOs if they’re _really_ against it, as a police force for the Mages’ Markets.”

“And ghettoize the Markets?” her husband asked her. “You know exactly how much work we’ve put into making sure magic-users _didn’t_ end up as an officially marginalized or disadvantageously-special legal group, but segregating the police forces like that would be a good start!”

“That’s _not_ what I’m talking about!”

“Well that’s what it sounds like!”

Nia looked beseechingly at her wife.

“The idea to form the Witchbreaker Auxiliary had its foundations in the Hunt’s early efforts to garner goodwill and legitimacy by planting Jäger in the Swiss police forces near Martigny,” Odette intervened. “Why not plant Jäger into the Republicans’ police sorcerers?”

“ _We_ don’t have that many sorcerers,” Nico told her. “Even if they did want we don’t really want them to do, and become Jäger fully intending to ask for honorable discharge as soon as they’re eligible, we wouldn’t have enough for a while. Statistically, the people who train to be sorcerers just don’t seem to also be that interested in law enforcement.”

“But why would they have to be _official_ sorcerers?” Odette asked him. “There are plenty of Honalenier and fey and fey-blooded Jäger who can and do use magic, but aren’t in the Zauberen Regiment, or even officially sorcerers. But they’d count as more magic-users for the Republicans’ police sorcerers, and then they’d have enough to properly police the Mages’ Markets- you wouldn’t even have to send Witchbreakers, since you already keep Witchbreakers with the Oversight Commissions for the police to call on, anyway. You’d probably have to take in more Jäger to make up the difference of sending people out to work in the Republicans’ police, but isn’t hiring more Jäger what you’re already trying to do?”

And this was why Nia asked her wife to come along to Hunt meetings that discussed difficult problems.

* * *

Augustin Gebar spared another scowl for the news coverage of Ravenna Garfagnini Saab and Tirreno Costa Kataiis’s engagement announcement. It was everywhere, and impossible to get away from- and truly disgusting.

No, it wasn’t enough that Izabed Saab had gone and married the President of the Roman Senate, a foreign national; and from a _Seelenvolk_ family to boot. That had been a bad enough move, politically, for Freiezuno, when so much depended on keeping the more Republican-minded Freiezunan politicians, not to mention the _actual_ Republicans, happy and not feeling like Imperial Genist sensibilities were stomping all over their toes.

Freiezuno had survived that, and Augustin even mostly approved of what they’d accomplished for the planet between them. One of his sole complaints- and it was a _big_ complaint, almost enough to cancel out everything else they’d done, in his mind- was that they were both fey and were going to outlive all the other politicians. In fifty years, it was going to start to be just the same as if they’d but Freiezuno _herself_ in charge of things.

Not that Hadiya would be bad at it. He quite liked Hadiya, and was highly in favor of the way her involvement with government was mostly confined to state events and making sure that the Freiezunans who _hadn’t_ gotten the message about political assassination no longer being acceptable were very clearly and forcefully informed of their misconceptions. Izabed Saab might not be the best person for the job, but he didn’t trust anyone else with it, except himself.

He wasn’t anywhere near the line of succession, though. If Saab hadn’t gone and gotten married, and had her daughter, then the Governorship would have gone to that mess of incompetence and suggestibility that was her nephew Béutros Saab.

Which wasn’t to say that there wasn’t a good reason behind why he’d invited said suggestible, incompetent mess to his house for a dinner party. Béutros Saab was still near the center of power, and that suggestibility made him easy to manipulate.

“No, I agree with you,” Augustin told the man. He’d had Béutros sat next to him at the table, and the rest of his staunch political allies were taking up the rest of the chairs. “Your cousin is most definitely in love with Princess Reno. But that doesn’t mean his parents won’t try to work through him. Look at the proposal he put forth to try to silence our criticism- could anything be more perfectly made to cut our rhetorical feet out from under us? Now all anyone has to do is play the sound bite of him and Ravenna standing together, looking blissfully happy, while he talks bright-eyed and smiling about how partnership with the Venetian trading empire could sustain us through the changes of the proposed _‘reconciliation treaty’_.”

“Isn’t it more than _‘proposed’_?” Béutros asked hesitantly. “The talks have almost gone to the Hunt-”

“And what happens when the Venetians use their new alliance to undercut _our_ shipping?” Augustin asked him. “They’ve done it before- you know how they added Ushippe to their Republic, and what they tried to do to Lonia.”

“But the Lonian government caught them,” the other man said. “ _We_ could catch them.”

“Possibly,” Augustin said. “But you’re forgetting _how_ the Lonian government caught the Venetians doing it. It was the Hunt and their Oversight Commission who caught the tail end that the Lonians followed to pull apart the bigger plot.”

Béutros relaxed in his seat.

“Then we’ll definitely be fine,” he said. “We have a lot more Jäger here now then there were in the old Oversight Commissions.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that.”

Time for some suggesting.

“I mean,” Augustin continued, now that he had Béutros’s worried attention. “That during that scandal, the Jagdsprinz was still full of hatred for Venice. Surely her bias could have influenced her Jäger to pay particular attention to Venice’s operations.”

There was absolutely nothing to support this, and there was no logical connection between the Jagdsprinz holding a vendetta against her surviving parent and the Hunt as a whole being more suspicious of the Republic of Venice as a state and government, especially when it was general knowledge, amongst the political set, that all of the higher-ranked Jäger had been very exasperated with the vendetta.

But Béutros was not noted for his reasoning skills, especially when something sounded plausible on the surface.

“And now she’s been working on reconciliation with _Razanás Venexia_.”

Time to sound friendly.

“I know _you_ have had some experience with trying to forgive people,” Augustin told Béutros, affecting a smile. “More than most, even. I can’t speak for you, but I know that _I_ have, in my efforts to make up with people who have betrayed me, overlooked warning signs of them abusing my willingness to try to be friends again, because I have convinced myself it’s nothing, that it’s old prejudice and hurt speaking.”

Actually, Augustin knew that _exactly_ that sort of thing had happened to Béutros, more than once. With the suggestion that the Jagdsprinz just _might_ be in a positon Béutros knew well- oh, _that_ was amusing, to think of someone like her being anything like something like him- whom he already would have been primed to think favorably about, given the friendship between her and his aunt; Venice was, by necessity, cast in the role of _‘villain’_.

The _‘betrayed me’_ , added into that, should have factored into the history of things the Jagdsprinz had said about Venice, and- oh yes, that was the look of someone who hadn’t realized the morsel they’d found in the conversation was meant as bait.

“So she wouldn’t be looking very hard at Venice now,” Béutros said, sounding a bit worried. “Or at all. And she’s friends with Aunt Izabed, so even if they _were_ still fighting, she wouldn’t think the Venetians risk something like that under nose.”

Oh, _wonderful,_ he was jumping to his own conclusions!

It was an effort for Augustin to keep from looking _too_ pleased Béutros had thought of this twist he hadn’t considered. With people like this around, he didn’t need to say a _thing_ to the news media to make sure there was trouble with the marriage.

“Maybe you should warn your aunt,” he suggested to Béutros. “Just in case.”

* * *

Reno was pleased to see that, in the days after the announcement, politics seemed to be following a manageable trajectory. Gradually, the media coverage was skewing more and more towards the advantages of closer ties with the other Independent Powers, instead of trying to place everything in the balancing act between the Republican Confederacy and Imperial State, especially since it looked like that was going to start to fall apart, soon.

He was less pleased when, about a week later, some clerk in a city court accidentally ended up giving the information that Damir Beilschmidt and Hengda Liukasiewicz had filed for a license to add Investigator Zannah Brahe from the squad to their marriage.

An _“investigative journalist”_ \- whom Reno was _not_ going to dignify with respecting their job title, he didn’t think someone who’d go digging for muck like this deserved it- turned up her sealed court records after a bit of digging, and wrote an article, and now there was a miniature uproar.

“It’s a shame the Jagdsprinz had to go on record saying the court records aren’t anyone else’s business, and that she’s in them because she was a witness to something and not because she’d done anything wrong,” Ravenna told him. They were curled up on the couch together, watching the news coverage of it, because they sort of had to. It was one of the things you did when you were born into politics.

“Well,” he replied. “At least they didn’t manage to get into the records, or track anything else down.”

* * *

Béutros Saab was concerned.

He hadn’t been meaning to listen to Augustin Gebar. The man had a long history of butting heads with his aunt, and she didn’t particularly like him, even if they weren’t quite rivals or enemies. The closest they’d gotten had been when Augustin had gotten very vocally upset about _‘undue foreign influence’_ when Aunt Izabed had married Constatin Garfagnini, and he’d eventually apologized about that.

But he had a point about Venice, and the Jagdsprinz. Béutros had been ambivalent about it, for a few days, and only been sort of generally worried; but not enough to go to Aunt Izabed about it, like Gebar had suggested.

It hadn’t seemed like it could be really real, then.

But then the announcement about Captain Hengda Liukasiewicz and Sergeant Damir Beilschmidt planning to add Zannah Brahe to their marriage had broken, right along with the fact that she had sealed court records that no one had heard about before, and-

The Jagdsprinz had said she was only a witness, but Béutros had connections and knew people who knew people, so he’d gotten scans of the sealed records.

Zannah Brahe might be a technical innocent, but it was by a very fine line.

Fine enough that Béutros wasn’t sure he could see it, honestly. She’d been _involved_ in almost summoning a demon! Maybe she was manipulated into it, but wasn’t that not supposed to count?

One of the scans was a short, official note, signed by the Jagdsprinz herself, swearing for the record that Zannah hadn’t done anything wrong _knowingly,_ and that her mentor had deliberately lied to her about how magic worked and what certain things did, so the usual excuse of _‘I didn’t know!’_ was actually a reason.

Apparently she’d fully cooperated with the Hunt once she’d worked out what Olivia Haynes was doing, and there was also a note that what the woman had put together wouldn’t have- in the Vatican’s expert opinion- done bunk with summoning demons; except intent really did matter, to the Hunt and to magic. It might actually have worked, he did admit later. It just wouldn’t have done it in the way he was familiar with, with Mephistopheles and whatever one Cassiel Navin had raised.

Mostly, the whole thing was just very worrisome, to Béutros. You were supposed to be able to trust the Hunt, and the Jagdsprinz; but he wasn’t sure he could trust this.

And if he couldn’t trust her on this, could he trust her on anything? Particularly with looking out for Freiezuno, against Venetian interests?

Or even against _Republican_ or _Imperial_ interests.

There- there had to be some way to test if the Jagdsprinz was-

He didn’t want to say _‘lying’_ , but he’d heard enough of the story about what had happened with Nadri Kataiis from his aunt, what her brother and the Jagdsprinz’s children had done to help her, to know that _they_ had gotten awfully close to witchcraft, too. It had tasted slightly of favoritism to him, that the Jagdsprinz hadn’t done more than put some Jäger to watching them, and he’d felt guilty about it.

_‘Clouded judgement’_ , Béutros decided, was the best way to put it. There had to be some way to test if the Jagdsprinz had gotten clouded judgement since trying to make up with Venice, and when it came to other things close to her family.

The Jagdsprinz could _not_ have clouded judgement. Too much rested on the authority inherent in the position

* * *

_Traffic duty,_ Buana silently begged the gods. _Please, let me be reassigned to traffic duty._

He’d never seen a real dead body before, and now that he had he wished he hadn’t.

“Look, I know you caught the lady who was doing the patchwork body thing,” one of the regular police officers was saying to Captain Liukasiewicz. “But this person clearly bled to death, only there’s not enough blood around to account for it all. Someone took the rest, and that seems pretty damn suspicious. And creepy.”

It was _extremely_ suspicious. There was a lot of magic you could do with blood.

“Taking other people’s blood for power is witchcraft,” he spoke up, trying to fight down nausea. Probably they already knew that, but he was Sorcery Officer, so it was his job to say things like this.

“Well, we don’t have any proof that it was taken for magical purposes, so we can’t involve the Hunt,” Sergeant Beilschmidt said, and then grimaced.

Investigator Gaylord- Aaliyah, she’d said to call her Aaliyah- had also flinched. Buana realized he was missing something, probably to do with their last case. It had gotten all over the news because it was so carefully _not_ witchcraft, so the Witchbreakers hadn’t been around when Sorcerer Steen was killed- only the rest of the squad had managed to take the witch down without any magic at all, which was pretty impressive.

“It could have just been taken as a trophy,” Captain Liukasiewicz said, but he didn’t sound like he believed it. “Do we know who this is?”

The regular officer held up an evidence bag, with a card wallet inside.

“Irmari herren Nandrike,” she told them.

“Oh, God, he’s üldrene,” Sergeant Beilschmidt said, rubbing his face with a hand.

“And officially a resident of the Jägerskov,” the officer said apologetically. “So we would have had to call you anyway, even if this didn’t look suspicious in light of the Frankenstein-witch.”

Captain Liukasiewicz looked over at his husband.

“Do we _count_ as the Hunt, in this situation?” he asked. “Under the Tripartite Treaty, I mean.”

Buana didn’t see why they wouldn’t- Hunt NCO was still Hunt. And the Sergeant was a _Beilschmidt._ You couldn’t get much more Hunt than that.

Judging by the way the regular officer was looking at them, she had a similar line of thought.

“Maybe, I don’t know,” Sergeant Beilschmidt said. “I’ll ask somebody. But let’s figure out what herren Nandrike was doing in Kharad, first. Whatever else, he got murdered _here,_ not in the Jägerskov.”  

* * *

“I think it actually worked,” Sebastian said, in a tone of admiration.

Reno looked up from his homework.

“What worked?” he asked. “What have you been doing?”

“Not _me,_ ” his cousin told him. “ _You._ With the stories. It’s panned out exactly the way you wrote it down- you came out with the reasons why closer ties to Venice could be good for Freiezuno, and everything quieted down, nothing broke, politically speaking, so you’re free to get married!”

“After we finish university,” Reno reminded him.

“After you finish university,” Sebastian agreed, and plopped down on his bed. “But it looks like it _worked,_ Reno! That’s really important- this could be a whole new branch of magic nobody bothered categorizing before, or thinking of! It’s like when technomancy got developed.”

“Well, I don’t _actually_ know it worked,” Reno said, putting his homework aside. “I didn’t really write things going any different than they probably would have, anyway. It could be coincidence.”

“You should run a test,” his cousin said. “To see if it is or not.”

Reno thought about it. He hadn’t really been planning on doing anything else with the stories, not yet, but it was important to know what you could and couldn’t do. If he didn’t know if or how this worked, then he might start something the next time he told a story, or just decided to write something-

Oh, that was pretty disturbing thought, actually. He _definitely_ didn’t want to accidentally make his short stories come true.

“It would have to be big,” he said. “So I’d know if it worked or not. And it shouldn’t be something that could have happened by coincidence. Can you think of anything?”

“Not right off,” Sebastian said. “But I could go get Maria and Nadri and they could help think.”

“Don’t let Emma or the others catch you,” Reno cautioned.

His cousin flashed him a smile, and closed his eyes instead of getting up.

Clever. He was going to ask them to come in shadow form.

Maria and Nadri showed up separately, Nadri with her literature homework, clearly as a pretext so she could claim she was getting homework help from her brother, and Sebastian and Maria were just hanging out.

Reno explained the dilemma to them.

“But I want it to be something nice,” he finished with, looking at Nadri especially. “Just… nice. Not like _‘adventurous and kind of dangerous but everything works out in the end’_. I don’t want anyone to get hurt.”

“I don’t know anyone with relationship troubles,” his sister told him.

“Love troubles don’t really have controllable variables, anyway,” Reno said. “I’d want something-”

“What do you mean, you don’t know anyone with relationship troubles?” Maria asked Nadri. “We _all_ know people with relationship troubles.”

“ _I_ don’t.”

“I don’t mean it rhetorically,” Maria said. “We all _do_ know people with relationship troubles. _Elti_ and your _Papà_ and the General.”

There was a quiet second.

“I’m not just going to _write_ them happy,” Reno told her. “That’s magical coercion. That’s _very_ illegal. That’s _witchcraft._ ”

“So don’t _‘write them happy’_ ,” she said. “Write them a situation where they _could_ all make up. For _real_ making up _;_ not _Elti_ feeling guilty about not being able to apologize to _Tante_ Zell and _Onkel_ Heinz.”

It _would_ be a relief to have the Jagdsprinz and _Papà_ not be so horribly awkward around each other all the time…

“Okay,” he said. “But I can’t imagine what would do that, short of Germany turning up alive.”

They were all staring at him now.

“No,” Reno said, catching on. “ _No. Think_ about it. He _has_ to be dead, or _have_ died, for the Jagdsprinz to become Jagdsprinz; and anyway it would be necromancy!”

 “It wouldn’t be necromancy,” Sebastian told him. “They’ve been really specific about that, the General even before anyone else knew. Germany didn’t _die._ He _stopped existing._ ”

“The Jagdsprinz would kill us.”

“No she wouldn’t,” Maria said. “Not for trying this, like this. And anyway, if doesn’t work, no one has to know.”

“That doesn’t really sound right,” Reno said doubtfully. ”And if it _does-_ what do we do _then?_ Becausethen it’s sort of our responsibility, whatever happens after. _Papà_ and _Mítera-_ I don’t want to hurt them, or make things hard for them.”

“They’ve worked through it once,” Nadri reminded him. “And even if there was a miracle, and this same thing happened, they’d have to do it anyway. There’s a price to every choice and every opportunity. I gave up the shadow part of my soul to feel comfortable with my body. You don’t think _Papà_ and the Jagdsprinz and the General would tell the truth as payment for having Germany back?”

“It could still hurt them,” he said. “Telling the truth.”

“I’m not saying it wouldn’t,” Maria said. “But they’d feel better afterwards, right? They’d be happy, because they had Germany back. But if you’re going to do this one, Reno, you need to be careful with it, because the easiest way to make that happen would be to tear Dietrich’s memories out and just swap them, wouldn’t it be? _‘The path of least resistance’_ and _‘the shortest distance between two points’_ applies to a lot of things. _That’s_ witchcraft, you shouldn’t do that.”

“How would _that_ be _‘the path of least resistance’_?” Sebastian asked his sister. “All that has to happen is that there’s a copy of Dietrich’s body and soul-essence, and then you condense enough magic to get some life force going, and then you attach the memories in and everything else will sort itself out. In all the universe, there’s enough magic to do _that_ a lot easier than trying to do something with _that_ level of finesse.”

“Tirreno,” Nadri said, and Maria and Sebastian shut up a second to pay attention. She and Reno almost never used the full versions of their name for good reason. “We’ve all read the book. We know how much _Papà_ hurt, losing Germany- and the Jagdsprinz and the General, too. You helped _me_ get better- why not them?”

“And what else are you going to find that just makes people happy?” Maria asked. “That couldn’t also be a coincidence?”

“There’s no _way_ this could be a coincidence,” Sebastian agreed. “If you _really_ don’t want to try this, we could try to think of something else-”

“No,” Reno said, making up his mind. Nadri was right- he’d helped her, and there was no good or moral reason not to do the same for the rest of his family, even if it was sort of strange thinking of the Jagdsprinz and the General as family. Sebastian and Maria definitely counted as family, but somehow their _Elti_ just didn’t really make it in there. “I’m going to do it. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work, and all we’ll get is a little disappointment. If it _does_ work- it could be really good.”

He cleared everything off his desk and got out clean paper, and the hard-lead pencil, and the nice pens. This would be harder than what he’d done for himself and Ravenna, because this was a much more specific situation; but with a little effort he could abstract it enough to fit the _‘loved one dies, people they left behind see them again for emotional closure’_ general plot.

It wouldn’t even be something like necromancy, then, he realized. That plot would lend itself perfectly to the way Nations paid visits from Irkalla.

“Don’t forget to put in the thing about Dietrich,” Maria ordered him. “That way if it _does_ work, it’s not because anyone else has gotten hurt.”

“If this does work,” Reno told the others, picking up his pencil with newfound confidence at the _‘not necromancy’_ revelation. “I might have to be terrified of myself.”

* * *

_Let me tell you the story of how brother once more met brother, and child once more father, and lover once more lover._  


	2. A Story Begins

There was something calming about a newly-started case board, even if it was about a murder. _‘Irmari herren Nandrike’_ was written up at the top, with the man’s picture, and that was all the information they had so far.

Damir created a pinned area and labeled it _‘Sindvern Rägnren/Hradnisa hren Nandrike’_. They were two of Irmari’s siblings, and were coming out from the Jägerskov to claim the body and give what information they could.

“Officer Tolvaj,” he said, finishing off the pinned area. “I can hear you thinking.”

“I thought huldrene had matronymic surnames.”

“They do,” Damir told him. “Üldrene have a more complicated set, because they actually have permanent family units.”

He pointed to _‘Hradnisa hren Nandrike’_.

“When the surname starts with _‘hren’_ , it means that they’re the alpha female of the family, or the alpha female in waiting. The other daughters have the _‘-kind’_ surnames you were probably expecting.”

“So then,” the new Sorcery Officer said hesitantly. “The _‘herren’_ is for the alpha males?”

“ _Oh_ no, absolutely not,” Damir told him. “No such thing. Sons don’t normally get a surname unless they get married-”

He pointed to _‘Sindvern Rägnren’_.

“-and then they take their wife’s name as a possessive. He’s married to some woman named _‘Rägnri’_. Unmarried sons don’t get surnames, officially. They get _‘-kind’_ on the paperwork because you have to have _something,_ but it’s not socially valid. _‘Herren’_ is for the castrated males- the stereotype is sons who their mother couldn’t marry off, but it’s a social position of some privilege, too. The traditional family roles are considered outdated in most of the üldrene harke- uh, home territory, it can mean family sometimes- who moved away from the Jägerskov to the human-dominated space settlements, which is why people don’t hear about it much.”  

The lobby desk buzzed their bullpen. Zannah had returned from the spaceport with Hradnisa and Sindvern, and they’d finished in the morgue.

Hradnisa hren Nandrike and Sindvern Rägnren were about what Damir expected from an alpha female in waiting and a married male üldrene. She was unconsciously confident in the authority she expected to have, and he seemed quietly parental, easily familiar with deferring to his sister and old packmate.

They were also trying too hard to seem nonchalant and unintimidated by his surname.

Damir wished he dared to sigh aloud and told himself that he could get through this. This was the story of his life.

“Rinnrdrusk?” he asked, giving the options for the talk. “Martinacher? We could do Farsuà if you’d like, but I thought maybe-”

“Rinnrdrusk is fine,” Hradnisa told him.

“Okay,” Damir said, and had them sit down. “So can you tell me why your brother was coming to Freiezuno?”

“He wrote policy for Lothar Imports-Exports,” Hradnisa said. “He started out doing organizational things, shipment schedules and plans, updating company guidelines and rules when laws changed. He moved over to HR after that, but he was doing policy for longer, and somebody from one of the Freiezunan shipping companies approached him to come help with their re-writes, since the treaty would mean all the trade regulations changed, and he’d done so well with the other ones…”

“So did he have problems with anyone?”

Hradnisa looked to her brother.

“Not that he ever said,” Sindvern told him. “LIE- Lothar Imports-Exports- they weren’t even upset that he was leaving. They’re looking to make easier shipping routes out to the Confederacy, is what Irmari said, so they were going to let him go temporarily so he could help out the company here and then go back to them and the company could be one of LIE’s partners out here. Apparently they did it with a couple of people.”

“Do you know who?”

Sindvern had a couple of names, people his brother had known, but said there were probably others and they could check with LIE HR.

“I don’t think you want to hear this,” Damir said. “But when your brother was killed, someone took most of his blood.”

There was a moment when the two üldrene just looked at each other.

“We were wondering why the Auxiliary was handling this,” Hradnisa said quietly.

“So can you think of any reason someone would have to do that?” he asked. “Is there maybe a sorcerer, a Disrägner, a family enemy…?”

“None.”

* * *

Forouzandeh was pleased with how well the Reconciliation Treaty was coming together, this time. After three centuries or so, she, the Imperial Human State, was finally in some sort of equilibrium with the International Republican Confederacy.

Not _too_ even of an equilibrium, of course. She was almost old enough to be as old as human cities, as human civilization and Nationhood itself, and Forouzandeh had done too much scheming to trade in her heart and her homeland and her dear people, her Iran, to become Humanity Imperial. The Republican Confederacy would always be second-string, to her.

She would make sure of it.

Artakshathra took up his customary spot _‘standing’_ next to her _‘throne’_ in the meeting room. Really, he was simply projecting his holographic illusion into the space next to her, and the chair she sat on was simply the fanciest in the room. Forouzandeh had seen a lot of empire, and was perfectly happy to leave the grand trappings of royalty and apparent power to the likes of the Kings of Honalee, and the _Großjagdsreich._ She was Empress of twenty-nine planets, and didn’t need grandeur to back up her actual power.

The title itself was technically meaningless. It had only as much power as it was given, or as the holder of it took- and _she_ had been the one to create it, indirectly, placing the idea carefully in other’s minds so as to seem a logical, yet fortunate recipient of the promotion to Nation and Head of State and Government to the new empire-in-name, three centuries ago.

Well, she had looked unconnected to the humans, but the other Nations of Earth had known- knew- the full extent of her planning and manipulation. The only ones left were the ones whom she’d picked to benefit from it, after all, and none of them had ever been too keen on the idea of publically owning up to being complicit in the political restructuring.

Forouzandeh _owned_ this empire, and the Reconciliation Treaty would go through on her terms, or not at all.

“Mother?” Artakshathra asked.

She left off her thoughts to smile at him, heart going warm. She’d always called the AI János Héderváry had assigned to her her son, but it had taken him longer to decide that she was his mother. She was still proud, and touched, every time he said it.

And he’d _grown_ so much, as well. He looked like a proper young man, in his late twenties or early thirties, on the cusp of beginning to take his authority.

Which he was. There were only two people Forouzandeh trusted totally and completely- Artakshathra, because he was her son and they loved each other; and General Beilschmidt, because she owned him unto death from the moment she’d gotten Dietrich Ehren secured as the Governate of Europe.

“Yes, Shathra?”

“General Beilschmidt wants to see you before everyone else gets here,” he told her. “And Antione Kalananka wants you to know that the Genov delegation is going to be a bit late, unless we delay.”

“Then by all means, let us delay,” Forouzandeh said. “Whatever the General’s business is, I’m sure it can be kept going for long enough for the delegation to be ready to come in with the others.”

Artakshathra nodded, the usual signal to tell her the messages had been sent. Her son was the true second power in this government- on ranking, it would be her, him, the General, and then Antione Kalananka, the human delegated to the tasks that needed Forouzandeh’s authority but that she couldn’t handle herself, because the empire was simply so _big._  

Her General came striding into the room only a minute later, walking around the laid-out tables for the treaty talks to get to her. Artakshathra took himself back behind her chair a step or two, to be unobtrusive.

“There’s no need to force yourself to be brief,” Forouzandeh informed her General before he could begin to speak. “We’re delaying to let the Genov pull themselves together.”

The General snorted to show what he thought of that sort of tardiness.

“I need to know what you want me to do about our intelligence operatives in Republican space,” he told her. “In the normal course of politics, I’d only pull back the spies that the Republicans _knew_ about; but if you’re particularly serious about fostering goodwill to get this treaty through-”

“Do you have agents you could burn?”

General Beilschmidt shrugged.

“Got a few I could promote to a desk job,” he said. “Get them some analyst training, put them on the office crew of the government they were working before. It could distract the Republicans into thinking that we’re not going to make _that_ hard of a play for their computer systems, once they hook up their planetary Internets to the network proper.”

“And what has János Héderváry said about talking to the planetary AIs?”

“Forouzandeh,” General Beilschmidt said; and for a moment they were Iran and Prussia again. There was a value in having an old Nation like him around as an immediate subordinate, so long as he remembered to keep moments like this to the necessary minimum. “Believe me when I say that there is _nothing_ we could use to buy the Republican AIs from János. We can’t suborn them, and János would never use the trust they have in him to sell them out. He can be sneaky at times, but he’s no spy. He was very firm that disconnecting Don from Earth’s Internet when the network went up was the only favor he was ever willing to do us. It’s best to save bothering him again for something we really _can’t_ manage. Don’s eldest, and he’s spent his whole life slipping in and out of computer systems, living on the edges of programs and cloud data and hidden file layers. The Republican AIs won’t be able to keep him out for long, if ever. If they’re not paying attention and he’s careful, they might not even notice he’s poking around.”

Forouzandeh had heard that news about János Héderváry before, but it bothered her more now than it had previously. Such a powerful free agent was annoying- Nico Agresta had at least had the good grace to join the Hunt and tie himself up with duties and responsibilities, and Lana Kirkland had closer ties to it than the father of her children did, so that only left János unattached and mostly unaligned. The only people he had stood with consistently, over the centuries, were the AIs he’d fathered.

“If we _had_ to buy him,” she said. “How would we do it?”

 “How would you buy the Jagdsprinz, or Nico Agresta?” he asked in return. It was clearly meant to be a rhetorical question, to make a point about how unobtainable János Héderváry was, but-

“I don’t know enough about General Agresta to say,” Forouzandeh answered. “But the Jagdsprinz’s price is easy. Promise her her father, and I have no doubt she’d break every rule she’s ever set for herself or that Ereshkigal has set on her, if she had to, to fulfil your demands.”

Her General’s expression hardened slightly, and a muscle in his face twitched momentarily as he refrained from speaking at the last second.

Germany, after all, would be the only thing that could buy him out from under her.

“If we _had_ to have János Héderváry,” he said, going back to the original point. “We wouldn’t be able to buy him. I know how I’d _coerce_ him, but I wouldn’t do it.”

“Oh?”

“Nothing’s worth having the Hunt and Honalee down on our heads,” General Beilschmidt told her. “And that’s what we’d get for posing a real threat to Árpád Héderváry. It would _have_ to be them, and not one of Lana’s kids. He loves all four of them, but Árpád’s the one he was scared over Cass for, and almost lost to the Ramman. It would hit him harder.”

“Could you?” Forouzandeh asked. “Be a real threat to Árpád Héderváry?”

He didn’t answer, not verbally; but she saw his jaw tighten.

“Of course you could be,” she said. “Backups and contingencies and alternatives to everything. I’m sure that hidden away somewhere in your files is a step-by-step of the best way to unseat Venice and Amphitrite, maybe even the Jagdsprinz. Me as well, certainly, though I promise you I won’t go looking for it.”

“Mother,” Artakshathra said. “The Genov are ready, and the first delegates are already on their way.”

“Burn whichever agents you think would be beneficial,” Forouzandeh ordered her General. “If you think it’s a good idea. I trust your judgement. And try to work out how we could buy János Héderváry without him taking it out on our souls after.”

* * *

“So, the Martinach Polizei confirmed that there aren’t any family feuds anyone knows about with herren Nandrike’s bloodline,” Medeas said, pointing to his screen. “That means we’re back to _‘why üldrene blood?’_ ”

They were expecting _him_ to answer that, of course.

“It depends who took it,” Buana told them. “It would be somebody’s affinity, what they thought about üldrene.”

“Yes,” Shakti said, leaning around the back of xer spouse’s wheelchair. “But we’re _police._ We need some _theories._ ”

That was _completely_ not how you handled magic.

“I can’t say for sure,” Buana said anyway. It wouldn’t do to look like he wasn’t _willing_ to this job, even if he didn’t want to  be here; or that he was incompetent or more totally unprepared for this job than he actually was. “If they’ve got more of a _‘lone wolf’_ idea of wolves, or üldrene, then it could be something with ferocity or independence. If they’re more for the pack idea, then it could be family, or home. Or it could be someone trying for a werewolf sort of thing, but without the undead aspect. It wouldn’t _work,_ but witches aren’t that known for, uh, logical reasoning or objectivity or historical research.”

“Put it on the board!” Shakti called to Aaliyah, and the woman put down Buana’s suggestions.

The only working theory they had, since they didn’t have any evidence of a personal grudge so far, was that someone had wanted, specifically, üldrene blood. If they could prove _that,_ they could prove witchcraft, and then this would be someone else’s problem. Then they could go back to having all of their time to work on tracking down the people the Frankenstein-witch had likely hired to do the killing.

Buana wasn’t sure which one he’d rather work on. The witch was terrifying, but she was dead; but this case pointed to witchcraft, and he’d be happy to get out of it before meeting an _actual_ witch.

“Do we know where our usually suspects were at the time?” Aaliyah asked.

Shakti checked xer messages.

“Last update from the Sergeant says that he and Zannah have all of them accountable,” xe said. “And the local toughs- oh. Not all of _them_.”

“Who?” Medeas asked.

Shakti flicked the information across the room to the board.

“Our short list for the people we thought the witch might have hired. None of their alibis checked out.”

* * *

Ivan wasn’t going to be here for the entire rest of the treaty talks- he’d come for the Hunt’s couple of scheduled days of arguing with the Republicans to give advice to his Prince as Marschall of Further Space. Anything Nia got the Republicans to agree to, as far as the Hunt’s presence in their space, would end up falling under _his_ authority and responsibility.

Initially, he was surprised to see Gilbert stepping out of the room they were going to be using for the treaty talks just ahead of Nia’s arrival there. There was the usual round of Nia and Gilbert silently not-quite-glaring at each other- refusing to speak to each other outside of business was a step above yelling during chance encounters, he supposed, and they’d even gotten pretty good at toning down the hostility.

But he smiled when the two finally passed each other and Gilbert’s expression settled into something else. Ivan knew _that_ look, and its appearance meant it that this was an opportune time for his favorite hobby at diplomatic events- antagonizing the Imperial State’s spymaster.

Ivan gently poked at Nia through the citizen bond they shared, to let her know that he was going to have a word with her uncle, and then intercepted Gilbert before he could get much further down the hallway.

“Feeling Forouzandeh’s collar, Prussia?” he asked pleasantly. He spoke in Russian, both an indication of the needling to come and an allowance to the other man’s pride. None of the people passing by them in the hallway would understand what they said, speaking this.

“I don’t want to talk to you, Ivan.”

“You do not mind _that_ much, Prussia; or you would have stepped yourself back to your office instead of standing here with me.”

“It’s not a collar.”

“Yes it is,” Ivan said. “One without a leash, certainly; and one you took willingly.”

“You’re damn right I took this job willingly!”

“Ah ah, Prussia- _collar._ ”

Gilbert’s expression dropped into something approaching a snarl.

“I’m doing _good work-_ ”

“So am I,” Ivan interrupted him. “And I even have as good a position as you. But _I_ was offered my job in good faith, and could have refused with no consequences but a welcome death. _You_ sold yourself to Forouzandeh after your family had all died or abandoned you. You wanted someone to _belong_ to, because Dietrich cast you off; but it is not really what you wanted-”

Gilbert whirled and started to stride away.

“It sticks in your throat, does it not?” Ivan called after him. “Bitter. Sharp once- sharp still, on occasion, but dull with familiarity.”

The other man stopped.

“Are you scared one day you will wake up used to it?” Ivan asked, affecting casual interest. “That you will stop feeling it? That you will end up _broken_ to heel, as a dog? Will you think remaking yourself was worth it then, _Prussia?_ Will you think that the memory of Ludwig that drove you try and try to keep Dietrich alive was worth it?”

 _“I hate you,”_ Gilbert hissed at him.

“You need me,” he said. “I keep you honest with yourself.”

* * *

 Hengda came down to see them in Interrogation.

“I heard you managed to pull in the short list,” he told his husband. “And I had to come see it for myself, after all the trouble we’ve had trying to get them in for the witch.”

“There are two others, too,” Damir said. “Aaliyah’s in with one of them- Achiauqui Chanayniev, one of the wandering sorcerers. He’s from La Canela originally. Can’t find anything that says why he left, but he’s got a string of assault charges on huldrene starting from Martinach. It could be he killed Irmari and just decided not to let the blood go to waste.”

“And the other one?”

“Shaska Kazia, human-trained sorcerer rather than from the traditional Honalenier apprenticing. _Was_ a technomancer, but got kicked off her ship and blacklisted by the Venetians for multiple drunk and disorderlies- well, drunk and then fighting- on shore leave; and a couple of times on ship with lower-ranked crew. She started seeing somebody for alcohol addiction and anger counseling, and got herself moved up from the blacklist to the probation list; but there’s a bar by the spaceport, not far from where we found Irmari, where she was drinking yesterday morning. We checked her record and-”

He passed his tablet over, with the pictures, instead of trying to explain. Hengda made a noise of sympathy.

“Beaten to a bloody pulp. Not how we found Irmari, but…”

“She’s got knife citations for the latest ones,” Damir said. “If she had an unlucky hit, or a couple of unlucky hits, and he bled out before there was any of the usual fighting, she might have tried to clean up after herself, gotten rid of the blood we’re missing, so she wouldn’t get kicked back to the blacklist _permanently-_ and honestly, Hengda, I _hope_ that’s it. I don’t _want_ another witchcraft case, or one that _should_ be witchcraft. We’re down too many people who can do field work and our Sorcery Officer is some kid just out of the academy who can’t even look at either of us straight on. _I’d_ go up against a witch before I let Buana anywhere _near_ one.”

“You know he didn’t want to be in the Auxiliary?” Hengda asked. “I asked for his record a couple of days after he came, since he didn’t seem like he was prepared for this, and he _wasn’t._ His primary assignment request, and most of his specialty classes, were for _port security._ ”

 _“Really?”_ Damir said. “ _Port security?_ I didn’t think anyone actually _requested_ that. Somebody who actually _wants_ to be there would be a nice change from everybody who gets shoved there because there aren’t enough openings anywhere else. How did he end up _here_ if he asked for _that?_ ”

His husband sighed.

“I had to call my mother.”

“ _Oh._ He’s a _political_ appointment.”

“An _unwilling_ one, it looks like,” Hengda told him. “The Senator from Zeshan is in _Mama_ ’s party, and apparently it was all _her_ idea.”

_“Great.”_

“So I thought that since you’d be going over to the port to ask for travel details…”

“You just said he can’t even look at us straight-on, and you want me to take him along?”

“It will be something familiar to him,” Hengda said.

“Yeah, I know,” Damir said, but wasn’t that happy about it. He didn’t like awkward situations. “Did Hradnisa or Sindvern send over what company Irmari was supposed to be working for?”

Hengda shook his head.

“He must have taken the letters with him, but we haven’t found them. They’re hidden somewhere in his luggage, or he threw them away, or whoever killed him stole them. His friends who were getting farmed out by LIE couldn’t remember the name properly either- they hadn’t heard of it before, one of them remembered that it’s some small local company that does luxury goods shipping, but that’s it.”

“It’s not Allan and Perch, is it?” Damir asked, naming the only small local luxury and rare goods shipping company he’d ever heard of.

“No, I asked them, they haven’t hired anyone from LIE,” Hengda told him. “Their own staff is handling it, and their lawyer on retainer. I _did_ send a message to LIE HR to ask for Irmari’s new assignment, but they haven’t sent anything back yet.”

 “Well, I’ll ask the regular officers to check over his luggage again on the way out,” Damir promised. “But if LIE sends the name over while I’m- while we’re out, send it over? Buana and I can check it.”

“Of course,” Hengda told him. “And I’ll tell you what the verdict is on the questioning, too. Hey-”

Damir had started to turn to walk away.

“Good luck,” his husband wished him, and grabbed his hand briefly to pull him back into kissing distance.

* * *

Feliciano was sitting in what would hopefully be the last string of meetings about the wording of the Reconciliation Treaty not because her country had much of anything to do with it- this treaty was between the Imperial Human State and the International Republican Confederacy, with a little bit of Hunt on the side- but because it had been deemed impolitic to be missing one of the four states under which fell almost all of humanity.

So this wasn’t a very _interesting_ way for her to be spending her time. It wasn’t even particularly productive, except for the fact that being here meant she knew exactly what was going on. A more convenient, even logical, way of doing this would have been to just have the chief ambassador come and take her place; but _no._

Forouzandeh was hosting it, so the Empress of Humanity Imperial was here. The Republicans had sent all but one of their Executive Council. Nia was here. All three of them had their assistants and secretaries and advisors and the general entourage of people big diplomatic events required- and so, Feliciano had to be here to represent Venice, or else make the Republic look not as important next to the other three.

But it really was a truly boring meeting. It was times like this she sort of missed the old UN meetings, which even if they weren’t always _productive_ or even necessarily peaceful _,_ had always been social and interesting. Nations just didn’t do those sorts of things any longer. They were too busy running their own countries, or serving as something like second-in-command to whoever was officially in charge, or not involved in government or politics at all and picked up human friends as they went from job to job and career to career. Nations met in small rooms over official politics, or made lunch dates with their neighbors or romantic interests or the one or two Nation friends they’d managed to pick up.

They didn’t have big _social_ gatherings any longer- or if they did, Feliciano hadn’t heard about it and no one had invited her. They didn’t have _parties._ They didn’t get together just for the sake of being together in the company of other Nations without any humans around.

The new Nations didn’t see the need for that kind of space, because they’d never had a reason to _want_ or _need_ to be away from humans.

Yes, absolutely, Nations were better off than they had been now than at basically any other point in history; and she was definitely thrilled that the younger ones, the Nations she’d raised as part of the Second Republic of Venice, had never had to live with orders or hurting their own people or even really war-

But the day the Genists and the Revived Republicans had won in their respective circles, Nations had lost about as much as they’d won, to Feliciano’s mind.

Everyone could do without the constant low-level fear, and the lying, and the paranoia, and all the other things that made the younger Nations consider people like her and Ivan and Yao and Forouzandeh and Marco and Gilbert traumatized to the point of irreparability, draconically controlling and prone to terror-fueled nastiness and general bastardry when their positions of authority were even a _little_ challenged, tolerated only because everyone knew what they’d lived through to survive to this point-

But Feliciano missed it. She missed the community. She missed the camaraderie. She even, in a weird way, missed the effort of keeping track of who couldn’t talk to who about what because of which war or other incident; and who had a particularly shit boss at the moment and could use people making things a little easier for them; and even the effort of making up and staying friends or family or loves after a nasty fight where the boundaries between political and the personal hadn’t been all that clear. Even when they’d hated each other they’d all still known they were Nations and in it together and the other person _understood_ in ways that the humans who were nominally on your side or backing you up never could.

These young Nations, if they ever _really_ fought, wouldn’t know how to make up. Some of them had reached over six and half centuries, and were still like fifty or a hundred-year-olds in some ways.

And maybe it was better, maybe that was better, and of course if something like that happened then they, the old ones, would be around to offer advice and help pick up and the young ones would learn but-

It still wasn’t the same.

Feliciano stopped paying even the slightest attention to what everyone was doing to think on this.

The emotion wasn’t nostalgia- that was too positive. It wasn’t exactly bittersweet, but it was sad. It was- if you could be homesick for a time you weren’t in any longer and not a place, Feliciano decided, than that was this feeling.   

She propped her tablet up in her lap instead of keeping on the table- this was a little rude, but she wasn’t even a part of this discussion, and tapped through to open the note-taking program and started to write.

It was an old therapy strategy she still used from time to time- Heinrich had made her start after they’d lost Ludwig, to try to keep her from just _stopping_ because she was holding so much of the grief and regret and loss in, and then Keld Schumacher had had her keep at it and made the other Nations who came to him do it too, she didn’t know where those writings had gone but the Office of Nations’ Affairs had kept records and that was the sort of thing Zell would have made sure her successors collected when Nations died so then Nia had probably ended up with them when the UN dissolved or the Nation who wrote them had just died so probably they were buried in the Hunt’s Archive somewhere- writing down what she was thinking that made her sad.

It turned quickly from a venting of thoughts to a sort of imaginary exercise, recalling UN meetings and fabricating what could have been going on if one was happening right now-

Well, Forouzandeh wouldn’t be up at the head of the table, for sure. Ludwig would be up there, frowning slightly in the way he did when he got impatient.

France and England might be having at each other. Mentally, Feliciano replaced them with the two scowly Republican Executive Councilors on the end of the delegation. The other two would be- well, Canada could be the quiet one and oh, _America,_ definitely the one in charge who was starting a disagreement with Nia. Ivan was sitting next to her and with _‘America’_ across the table like that then she could almost pretend Nia was Natalya, standing up for her brother.

The other Nations filled in around the table in her imagination, most sketchy, just a presence, not really standing out in her thoughts-

Lovino would be sitting next to _her,_ that was clear. He’d have a running biting commentary on everyone else’s actions, and she could line up the irate muttering of her brother with the expression on Ludwig’s face almost perfectly, as he had a politer, unvoiced version of Lovino’s opinion of everything running through his head.

Meetings had been a lot more bearable, with Lovino to listen to and Ludwig to watch.

* * *

Buana was absolutely certain that he was going to mess something up, because he was too nervous around the Sergeant to focus properly on his job.

It wasn’t that the Sergeant was terrifying- _Emma Miccichelo_ had been terrifying, even just walking through the room in uniform. Part of it was the reputation but most of it had been that she _looked_ like the sort of person who’d have knives stuck down her boots and a garrote hidden somewhere on her person to supplement her gun and officer’s knife, and positively enjoy using any or all of them on someone.

Sergeant Beilschmidt didn’t have that look. He was sort of quiet, in a self-contained way, which was a different sort of intimidating, like you’d never know he wanted you dead until you were. Buana knew the Sergeant _probably_ wouldn’t kill anyone, or _hadn’t;_ but he was a Beilschmidt and sort-of technically in the Hunt, and Aaliyah had told him that the Sergeant’s mother was _General of Intelligence Special Operations_ so Buana was certain that he _could_ kill somebody if he had to.

But the main problem was rather that the Sergeant _was_ a Beilschmidt, and was related to just about everybody on High Command, but was sitting in Freiezuno as the Sergeant- not even the _Captain-_ of the NCO Witchbreaker Auxiliary, and Buana couldn’t figure out _why._

He was pretty sure that it meant he, himself, was expected to do something very impressive or important, and that scared him. A lot.

 Kharad Port Security had pulled the travel records for Irmari herren Nandrike and the two wandering sorcerers the Sergeant and Investigator Brahe had brought in. Shaska Kazia’s last time in space had been on the ship that had kicked her out in Kharad seven months ago, but Achiauqui Chanayniev had only come in a few days before herren Nandrike, from Aizuasleron. Irmari herren Nandrike had had a direct flight from Martigny to Kharad.

Buana had felt pretty good about himself, after the Sergeant had seemed let down to find that the other passengers on herren Nandrike’s flight didn’t immediately stand out, for thinking to suggest that they follow herren Nandrike on the security footage to see if any of the people on his flight, or someone else in the airport, had followed him off the premises.

They followed the üldrene on the security footage- out of the terminal, to the baggage claim, to the bus shuttles to the hotels- but nothing showed up, and then he just felt pretty stupid.

Aaliyah messaged as they were leaving, on the Sergeant’s tablet. The Sergeant had handed it over during their trip to the port, with a request to _‘keep an eye on it’_ for him, since he was going to be talking to Port Security officials.

“ _‘ROs say no letter in luggage’_ ,” Buana read out loud. “ _‘ROs’_?”

“Regular officers,” he said. “Not Auxiliary. Anything about Interrogation?”

 Buana had to message back to ask for that.

“They had to let the, uh, _‘short list’_ go, sir, everyone but a Vissa Lauer, one of them recounted on what they’d said and it turns out all the rest of them were lying to cover up being out at one of the organized illegal gambling places, so Investigator Gaylord passed them off to the regular officers-”

“Chanayniev and Kazia?”

“Um- Investigator Gaylord-”

“You know you can call her Aaliyah.”

“Just a second sir- oh, Aaliyah, Aaliyah says that Investigator Brahe went in with Chanayniev and as soon as she said _‘witchcraft’_ he got all terrified and told her he was down on, uh, Blanchardi Street and he bought something from the jack store there and he brought up his bank account to prove it, the crediting and the place match. Aaliyah says that she didn’t ask too hard about what he bought.”

“The Blanchardi Street jack store is run by one of Kharad’s Small Witches,” the Sergeant told him, and Buana froze up.

Witches? _Witches?_

“ _‘Small Witches’_?” he managed to squeak.

The Sergeant stopped walking. They were in one of the staff access hallways, about to exit to the staff parking area and walk over to take the shuttles back to the city proper themselves.

“Right,” the Sergeant muttered to himself. “Right.”

He raised his voice again.

“It’s a Hunt term,” Sergeant Beilschmidt said. “The Small Witches are the people who break the Jagdsprinz’s Pact in little ways, stuff that’s not actually posing a threat but still against the spirit of things. The people who hide Tarot packs- fortune-telling cards- or a crystal ball or runestones, but don’t actually put any magic behind it, just do it for a bit of a thrill or fun or who knows what. The people who collect demonologies, but we do keep a closer eye on them- that sort of thing. We don’t _arrest_ them, because we’re not about _fascism,_ but we keep track of them, just in case. They know we know that they know we’re watching them, and it works out. They don’t do anything besides be a bit sketchy or shady, and we keep our distance unless they change from poking at the corners of the Pact to punching holes in it. It’s kind of strange that Chanayniev would try to disclaim real witchcraft by associating himself with the Small ones, but-”

The Sergeant shrugged.

“Scared people don’t always make sense. What about Kazia?”

“I-”

Buana looked down at the tablet he’d been getting the updates on. It was the Sergeant’s, and he’d handed it over when they’d started looking at the security footage.

“You can ask her,” the Sergeant assured him. “We’ve got time. Shuttle hasn’t come around yet.”

But he should have _thought_ of that, asked when all the names didn’t come up-

He sent it quickly. The reply came as the shuttle turned into the parking lot.

“They’re holding her still because she’s _‘too scared to talk’_ is what Aaliyah says, but Medeas is going to sit with her a bit and try to convince her to admit she fell off the wagon and then take her to her counselor’s if that’s all. They don’t think she did it, sir.”

“Well,” the Sergeant said. “I don’t really think she did it either, even if that would be a neat end to it all. If we’ve found whoever it was yet, I think it was Lauer.”

* * *

Things had been very normal, in their shared apartment, even with the underlying tension of all four of them waiting to see if Reno’s experiment worked.

There was something bothering Maria about it, now, trying to bring Germany back; but she hadn’t been able to quite figure it out yet.

In the meantime, there were classes, and homework, and avoiding the bodyguards, and talking with her brother and Reno and Nadri; and then eventually a surprise message.

It was from Verity Kirkland-Héderváry, who had insisted on being just _‘Verity’_ to her once she’d stopped studying under him. She’d seen him a couple of times over the semesters she’d been attending the Imperial College at Kharad, but it had been a while since the last one and usually there was a run-up of shorter messages before he asked for a lunch date or something.

Almost all of them had been over at the HabéTech labs, or at a café near them, but this time he wanted something different; and from what he said, Maria couldn’t blame him.

_‘I can’t take this anymore, the Honda-Brynjarssons are still fishing for a spouse for Noah and since you left I guess they’d exhausted the easier options, because now they’re after **me.** Could I escape my job and meet you for a slightly-late lunch on campus, or near campus, or anywhere not here sometime soon? I’m quitting already anyway, they have my two weeks’ notice, but that’s only made them sporadically more determined to try to get me. I can tell you about my finishing project I’m almost done with I’m doing to make them happy, and you can tell me about school or something. Have a good date?’_

She did, actually- she was free tomorrow afternoon.

* * *

Hengda messaged about Irmari’s new company while Damir and Buana were getting off the spaceport shuttle to connect to a city bus. Buana handed it over immediately, informing him that it was his husband.

Irmari had been hired out of LIE by some company Damir had never heard of, Kgosi-Rotem Carriers, and a check of the office address against the bus map gave a route and a reasonably-close stop. It was in one of the mid-range income business areas, and it didn’t seem strange that Kgosi-Rotem would be here until they got to the office.

It was in one of the multi-floor office buildings where businesses could rent space. There was a nice clean lobby at ground level, playing at being pretentious and more important than it probably was, and Kgosi-Rotem was on a floor between two accountancy firms. The front wall opposite the elevator bank was panes of glass with lettering etched in.

They were clearly meant to be automatic-opening, but as they walked towards them, they didn’t open.

“Are they closed?” Buana asked.

“They shouldn’t be,” Damir said. “It’s mid-afternoon halfway through the week. They should be _busy._ ”

He knocked on the glass.

“It doesn’t really look like anyone’s there, sir. Could you leave a note at the building desk-”

 Someone came out of a side room, headed for the office lobby desk. It didn’t seem like they’d been noticed.

Damir pounded on the glass, and when the man whirled around, he put his ID wallet up against the glass to show his badge. The man inside reached behind the raised front of the desk and the doors _click_ ed, and slid open.

“I’m Sergeant Beilschmidt of Kharad NCO Hunt Auxiliary,” he said, walking in. “This is Sorcery Officer Tolvaj and we have some questions about a recent hire of yours.”

“I’m not authorized to give any information.”

Damir ignored him. When people started off with denials and trying not to talk, sometimes pressing it made them open up.

“Lothar Imports-Exports says that they recently reached an agreement to farm out one of their policy writers, Irmari herren Nandrike, to you. Herren Nandrike was found murdered in an alley shortly after leaving Kharad Spaceport.”

“I’m not authorized to give any information,” the man repeated.

“That may be but we do need our questions answered so if you could take us to someone who is authorized-”

“You are not authorized to have any of our information.”

That… was not what Damir had been expecting to hear.

 _“Excuse me?”_ he asked in disbelief. “We are duly- and rightly-appointed officers of the law-”

“I will not answer your questions but I _will_ tell you is that you are not currently authorized to have any of our information, Sergeant Beilschmidt, and I _will_ be informing my superiors that you came by.”

“And your superiors are-”

“You are not authorized-”

“Fine. Just _your_ name then.”

“None of your business,” the man said, and ordered them out.

* * *

The Jagsprinz hadn’t noticed. He’d _tried_ to get her attention- but, nothing. No indication she’d noticed. No indication she _cared._

Still, Béutros Saab wasn’t _quite_ ready to write her off _just_ yet. She was busy at the moment, after all; and maybe he’d been too subtle.

He’d have to try something more obvious. If she didn’t catch on to _this…_

* * *

“Kgosi-Rotem was _extremely_ standoffish, and very suspicious,” Damir told his husband that evening. “There was only one person there that I could find any indication of, which makes no sense given the time or the business they’re supposed to be in, and he wouldn’t answer anything we said and switched over _really_ quick from _‘I’m_ not authorized’ to _‘You’re_ not authorized’, which is _bullshit,_ we were doing our _jobs-_ ”

“Someone’s calling you, sweetheart.”

It was his mother.

“ _Mutti-_ ”

“Damir, could you please explain to me why I just got off the phone with Freiezuno’s Federal Intelligence Office, and why they think that I was using you as a cat’s paw to try to intrude into their operations?”

“I… really couldn’t say, _Mutti,_ ” he said, letting his confusion and disbelief come through clearly in his tone. “I don’t think I’ve ever actually talked to anyone from FIO.”

Hengda gave him a _look_ when he mentioned Kharad’s spy agency. Damir tried to convey through facial expression and hand gesture to his husband that he had no idea what was going on either. The idea seemed to come across, because the other man went for the kitchen to get some dessert.

“Well _they_ just told me that you harassed one of their high-ranking field operatives today and they said if I didn’t do something about it they were going to take it to the Governor and she could bring it up with the Jagdsprinz.”

“I haven’t talked to any FIO people today!” he protested. “We brought in some people for questioning on Irmari herren Nandrike’s murder and then Hengda asked me to take Officer Tolvaj along to Port Security to talk to _them_ and while we were out there we got the name of the place that LIE farmed him out to so went over there and they were _incredibly_ uncooperative but that’s all that happened today, so unless they’ve been keeping some of our short list of potential murderers-for-hire then I definitely haven’t-”

“Who hired herren Nandrike?”

“Kgosi-Rotem Carriers.”

“Dear fuc- _God._ Damir, is your husband there?”

“…Yes?”

“Get him over here and put me on speaker.”

“Hengda, _Mutti_ wants you!” he called, and Hengda ambled back out of the kitchen with a bowl of ice cream, giving the phone a suspicious look. Damir put her on speaker. “He’s here, _Mutti_.”

“You two pick somebody from your office to take over for you tomorrow and air out your dress uniforms tonight,” she told them. “I’m going to call FIO back and they are going to _explain_ this. Emma Miccichelo is going to come pick you up from your house tomorrow and if I can swing it, _I_ will show up; and if Gilbert Beilschmidt doesn’t send somebody I don’t _care_ how upset _Tante_ is at him I _will_ have her talk to him. We’re all going to meet with the FIO officials, and they’d better have a damn good explanation about why they were hiring huldrene out from under us through the shell company they and the Imperials use to cover their operations in Republican space.”

* * *

“Idunn,” Nia said to her AI, flopping down onto her bed in the diplomatic quarters in the Imperial Residence on Helike. The treaty talks had been over for the day, and she’d dealt with the Hunt business that had come up, and it would be _very_ nice to be finished. “Please tell me that my empire managed to keep a hold of itself better than Freiezuno has been.”

“Freiezuno has been handling itself very competently.”

“You’re not funny when you’re being deliberately literal,” Nia informed her. This was a well-worn statement between them.

“I am _so,_ ” Idunn false-whined in her earpiece. Now, with the traditional response done, she could give the news. “The _Großjagdsreich_ is doing fine, Jagdsprinz. The Governors are holding anything that absolutely needs your attention for when you’re done here, and the Imperial Legislative and Judiciary Council are still confining themselves to discussing possibilities. I think there’s going to be a briefing.”

“Of _course_ there’ll be a briefing. Did you send the daily meeting summary?”

“Right after it let out.”

“Great,” Nia said, and sat up so she could take off her boots. Hunt dress uniform called for very polished black riding boots, all right for sitting or standing in, but less comfortable for lying down. The coat had to come off, too, with the metal buttons and the decorations; and the sword belt she had to hang over the back of her seat for these talks because it wasn’t really something to sit in a chair with, especially not for long periods- “Then could you call Odette?”

Her wife picked up a couple of seconds after she dropped her sword to the floor and went back to flopping, much more comfortably.

“I know it’s really late in Martinach,” she opened with, a sort of apology.

“It’s not quite midnight yet, Nia,” Odette told her. “It’s not late until it’s midnight.”

“You _are_ sleeping, right?” Nia asked. “You’re not letting the empire keep you up just because I’m busy and you’re doing some of my work?”

“Since when do I let the empire keep me up?”

“You’re still awake _now._ ”

“Because I knew you’d call,” her wife told her, sounding a little amused. “You called all the other nights, even if it was earlier than this, and I didn’t want to miss it.”  

“But now you’re going to be tired in the morning,” Nia said. “I would have called you back tomorrow.”

“It wouldn’t be the same,” Odette said. “For either of us, and you know it. Now what’s happened that’s kept you busy?”

Nia sighed, and rolled over in bed to lie on her side.

“Some sort of political mess-up with Freiezuno,” she told Odette. “LIE has been farming out policy writers to Freiezunan shipping companies-”

“Yes, I remember. The work visas.”

“Well one of them, an üldrene, _he_ turned up murdered in an alley in Kharad not long after landing, and Damir got the case because there’s a significant quantity of blood missing-”

_“Really?”_

“They haven’t proved witchcraft yet,” Nia said. “But I’m betting they will, and then Vasco can handle it. So today Damir went to talk to the company on Freiezuno who’d done the hiring, and it turns out it was Kgosi-Rotem Carriers.”

“That sounds familiar,” Odette said, after a few seconds of expectant silence. “But I don’t remember why.”

“It’s the shell company Freiezuno’s Federal Intelligence Office shares with Imperial Intelligence to act as a cover for some of their field agents in Republican space. They travel in Kgosi-Rotem ships, they send back information coded into Kgosi-Rotem shipping manifests and memos and invoices, they smuggle goods and people in Kgosi-Rotem crews and packages-”

“And they’re doing this _now?_ ”

“FIO called Mäelle to complain about being investigated, and Mäelle called them back and demanded a meeting for tomorrow- today? whenever it is right now on Freiezuno- so _she’s_ going over there and Damir and his husband are going and she asked for Emma and I have to send _Ivan_ too,” Nia complained. “They’re going to be meeting with the General and the FIO Secretary and maybe Hadiya or Constantin, too; I don’t know. But I have no _idea_ what they were thinking doing this all _now!_ We’re trying to get a _treaty_ signed and if it looks like we’re conspiring with the Imperials to spy on the Republicans-”

“Well, we both _are._ ”

“But not _together,_ ” Nia insisted. “The Republicans and the Imperials and Venice and the other Independent Powers know we spy on them and we know they try to spy on us and everybody’s perfectly happy so long as everybody stays in their bounds, and mounting _joint_ intelligence operations is _not that._ If they’d wanted to, I don’t know, boost their cover story by hiring out from LIE for the policy writing like the other companies are, they could have _asked us!_ Mäelle’s got people! _Arik’s_ got people! Or they could have just faked the entire thing and we would have helped them lay a paper trail that made it _look_ like they hired someone! But instead they’ve gotten us involved in _this_ mess!”

“So is Ivan or Emma supposed to be the intimidation portion of the Hunt’s delegation?” Odette asked, amused.

“Both of them, either of them, whatever works!” Nia said. “So long as we get out of this as quickly as possible and don’t make it a news item. I hope whoever was responsible for this gets _fired._ ”

“And if it was the FIO Secretary?”

“Then the Department of Intelligence and Central Espionage can kill some time getting to know her successor!”

Her wife gave her a moment to fume in silence, uncommented upon. It was nice, having someone who knew when to do that.

“It’s won’t get out, Nia,” Odette told her. “The General and FIO don’t want to draw attention to themselves any more than you want anyone to think that you’re involved in it.”

“If they let something slip-”

“Then you can rightly blame them for dragging you into it,” Odette said. “Let Mäelle and Ivan worry about it, Nia. That’s _their_ job. You focus on getting the Republicans to agree to accept Jäger into their police sorcerers.”

“I think I’ve almost convinced them,” Nia told her. “They were making some noise about chains of command but I think I talked them around to having a confederal supervisor. I talked about it with Ivan and he says he’d be fine having another General under him to serve as final authority specifically in Republican space; but depending on how stubborn they are I might have to offer a new Marschall. I don’t really _want_ to, but the problem would be who to promote either way. I don’t want to lose Nico.”

“Would he even agree to being stationed that far away from you and Diana?” Odette asked. “He’d be closer to his son, I guess, but you’ve always kept the married couples together as best you could.”

“I wouldn’t _want_ him to go, anyway,” Nia said. “I _like_ having him in Martigny. And he’d get snippy at me if I tried to send him so far away and try to lecture me about how nobody else argues with me like he does- which is _not true,_ Ivan argues with me, and so does Diana, and sometimes Arik and Mosè, and Lord Hiruz doesn’t really _argue_ but he’s got that way of being perfectly polite but still clear that you’re seriously lacking in sound decision making skills. I _can_ live without him!”

“ _Can_ you?” Odette asked, and Nia half-wanted to smile at the teasing tone in her wife’s voice. “He’s the only one who’s known you your entire life, could you bear to be away from each other? The last time he went on inspection for the Zauber Regiment the only person he called more often than Diana was _you,_ and _your_ call was the one he saved all the complaining and nitpicking for.”

“He only called me every time right after her to save time.”

“I didn’t say anything about that. Nia, the two of you don’t argue- you _quarrel._ Like an old married couple.”

“Well,” Nia told her. “I like you better than him.”

“I know,” Odette said. “But the Hunt and the _Großjagdsreich_ could continue operating if I wasn’t around. The Hunt and you, and then so the empire, would fall half-apart without _him._ You should send somebody else to the Republicans.”

“But I like all my senior Zauber right where they are!” Nia protested. “I can’t send Nico because he wouldn’t do it and I don’t trust anyone else with the Regiment, and Demyanev is too good with the Witchbreakers, and I don’t want to move Luisa from the Workshop-”

“You could send Vasco,” Odette suggested. “He’s close enough in Freiezuno already, and I don’t think you’ve promoted him since he joined, beyond the restructuring times when _everybody_ changed to accommodate new ranks.”

“I don’t know if he’d be good for it,” Nia said. “He’s got just about the most seniority, but he’s never really… stood out. Been exemplary in any way.”

“Luisa’s biggest achievement when you gave her the Workshop was making a really stupid decision,” Odette reminded her. “Because I goaded her into it, but still. Has Vasco ever _gotten_ a chance to stand out?”

“I honestly can’t remember.”

“And he doesn’t have to be _outstanding,_ anyway. Just competent. Mosè’s very competent, and Arik and Luisa, but they’re not really what you’d call outstanding, either. Good at their jobs, yes; and well-connected, yes; and definitely powerful- but not necessarily _outstanding. ‘Outstanding’_ is people like Ivan or Magda Eisenhart or Emma or Nico, maybe Árpád and Terenzia, and of course yourself.”

“Well,” Nia said. “I’ll ask Ivan about Vasco, then; and tell Nico to get a list of Zauber who might do well.”

“ _I_ can tell Nico,” Odette said. “I’ll be seeing him tomorrow anyway.”

“No, I can have Idunn tell him,” she told her wife. “Thank you, though.”

“You’re still coming back for Michaelmas, right?”

 _“Absolutely,”_ Nia said. “I need to get _away_ from these people- and what sort of Jagdsprinz would I be, missing the feast day of the patron of police officers and the military?”

“Just as good as a Jagdsprinz as you’ve always been,” Odette said. “But it will be nice to see you again, even if you have to go right back.”

“I’m taking the whole day off, Martinach-time, don’t worry,” Nia told her. “But you need to go to sleep, _liebe._ ”

“Yes, _fine,_ Nia. I love you.”

“Goodnight, Odette.”

* * *

Freiezuno had turned into a happening sort of place over the last week or so, and Emma was pretty pleased by this development. First, she’d gotten to go down to talk to the NCO Auxiliary instead of having babysitting duty; and now she got to go sit in on an Intelligence meeting instead of having babysitting duty.

She was dangerously close to having her _job_ back, and it was wonderful.

Emma had made small talk with Damir and Hengda, and said hello to Mäelle, and caught up a bit with Marschall Braginski, and now had the satisfaction of having the FIO Secretary eyeing her more than she was paying attention to Mäelle, or even the Marschall, while she smiled at Constantin. She could talk to her cousin after the meeting, maybe.

The meeting was her, Mäelle, and Marschall Braginski for the Hunt; Damir and Hengda for the NCO Auxiliary; the General and Donner von Maskinsjälen for the Imperials; and the FIO Secretary and Constantin for Freiezuno.

“It seems like there’s been a major mix-up,” Constantin said to open the meeting. “And we’re sorry for it. But Secretary Ahna swears to me that FIO never hired Irmari herren Nandrike, and didn’t know he existed until Sergeant Beilschmidt came to the Kgosi-Rotem offices yesterday.”

“I wish you hadn’t said that,” the General told him. “Because we didn’t either.”

“Well _somebody_ hired him,” Mäelle snapped at them both. “And we went to LIE, and all the paperwork and confirmations were correct for Kgosi-Rotem.”

She pulled out a paper file to show her evidence.

“The stationery’s correct. The hiring paperwork is in order. They even have the current and correct _authorization codes_ and _security access_ on them. _Somebody_ somewhere is lying, and maybe it’s not either of you and you _didn’t_ order him hired, but then it’s one of the people under you; which does _not_ fill me with confidence in your operating procedures.”

“Let me see,” Donner said, and Mäelle slid the paper file over to him. The General opened it for him and flipped pages as the AI moved an illusory hand over each sheet, scanning the RDIF tags embedded into the fibers.

He looked to the FIO Secretary.

“The metadata on these tags say they’re _yours,_ ” he told her, and the General pushed the file over to her side of the table and leaned back in his seat, relaxing minutely now that he thought his people had been cleared.

“Got yourself a mole or a political agitator, huh, Helen?” he said. “I have to say this does _not_ fill me with confidence in your abilities, especially in a political touchy time like this. This is a _security breach._ ”

Helen Ahna had gone red with indignation.

“You think I don’t _know_ that, General Beilschmidt?” she demanded. “This will be an _internal_ investigation, but I assure you- none of _my_ people who know these codes could be compromised.”

“Oh?” he challenged. “Who has the codes?”

“You really expect me to tell _you?_ ”

“You don’t have to name names, Helen,” Constantin told her. “But could we cooperate a little, please?”

There were a couple of tense silent moments between them, which Emma could only interpret as an unvoiced conflict between how Constantin wasn’t _technically_ in charge of Helen Ahna, since he wasn’t his wife; but on the other hand his wife had clearly deputized him for this meeting.

It was Helen who gave in.

“Myself, Governor Saab, the Deputies Regent, the Director of the federal IRC desk, and many of the agents in Kgosi-Rotem with executive-level cover,” she supplied, obviously unhappy about being ordered to do so.

“The Deputies Regent but not the Deputy Governor?” Marschall Braginski asked.

“Ravenna’s still in university,” Constantin said. “Izabed and I aren’t going to force her into work until she’s finished there and gotten married to Reno and settled with him, at _least._ It will be another five years, maybe seven or eight, before she starts taking more government responsibility than public relations appearances. Béutros and I can handle the work of Deputy Governor in her name until then. It’s not Deputies do a whole lot, anyway, until the last couple of years before the old Governor is going to retire or looks to die.”

“You gave _security codes_ to _Béutros Saab?_ ” the General said.

“Just because my nephew-in-law would be a terrible Governor, General Beilschmidt,” Constantin told him. “Doesn’t mean that he can’t keep secrets with the best of them. He knows he has a duty to Freiezuno by his birth, however that ends up looking.”

“As I was _saying,_ ” Helen Ahna picked up again. “No one from _Freiezuno_ leaked those codes. I place total trust in all of them. I have no idea how those papers came to be, but I bet once I start investigating, it will have been Republican dissidents who don’t want the Reconciliation Treaty going through.”

“They’re still _your codes,_ ” Donner told her. “Then they’ve _stolen_ them.”

“Sometimes people steal things,” the FIO Secretary said stubbornly. “Security breaches happen, and it’s better when someone exploits them, and exploits them _stupidly_ like this, instead of being careful or intelligent about it, because then you know you’ve _got_ a breach.”

“ _Find it,_ then,” Marschall Braginski ordered her.

She glared at him, to remind him that she wasn’t under _his_ authority, and looked to Damir and Hengda.

“Just stay away from the Kgosi-Rotem offices,” she told them. “We don’t need the Hunt poking around and drawing attention to us. We’ll send along whatever we find to your Marschall, and he can pass it down.”

“Or you could deliver it directly,” Marschall Braginski said, in the bland way Emma knew meant he was really _telling_ you.

“What, and have a FIO runner going to the Hunt?” she demanded. “That’s almost _worse._ ”

“They could go plainclothes.”

“I bet it won’t even go that far,” Helen Ahna said. “They’ll turn up some sort of feud or vendetta or wrong place, wrong time they overlooked, and this whole meeting will have been a waste of time.”

“It’s not a waste of time when you find out you have a _security breach,_ ” Mäelle shot at her.

“We checked for family feuds with the Martinach Polizei, Secretary Ahna,” Damir said. “They said there wasn’t anything.”

Emma had been in the Hunt for centuries, yes, but she’d grown up first in Rome, and still remembered the differences between Martigny and her home she’d found then. Rome was pretty assimilated to the mindset of Martinach now, even if they’d managed to keep the cultural differences; but Emma knew what sort of thinking there was in Martinach about huldrene and Honalenier in general, and there was potentially a very large blind spot in Damir’s statement.

No that she actually wanted to bring it _up,_ at least not at a meeting in front of outsiders. Exposing your own shortcomings in this sort of situation wasn’t really considered a good political move, but justice should always trump politics.

“Damir- Sergeant Beilschmidt,” Emma said. “Captain Liukasiewicz. Did the Martinach Polizei check for family feuds on the maternal line, or the maternal line _and_ the paternal line? Because the paternal lines aren’t officially required to be on-file in records, and very often people don’t think to check in on father’s or grandfather’s or uncle’s families at all, especially since they don’t have the information or the reminder right there.”

There was an embarrassed, awkward silence, and she tried to non-verbally convey to Damir and his husband that she hadn’t been trying to make them look incompetent.

“I have no idea,” Hengda eventually admitted.

If it had been at all politic, Emma would have kicked the vindicated look right off of Helen Ahna’s face.

* * *

Maria had picked the café where she was meeting Verity for lunch, and had gotten to the point where she was worried that he’d gotten lost when he finally showed up.

“Hi, I’m late, I’m sorry,” he said, sliding into the seat across from her at the sidewalk table. “I know _Apa_ had some hand in making the Honda-Brynjarssons hunt around for spouses like they do but _my God, **those people,**_ I’m ashamed to be related to them ** _._** I had to hide in someone else’s office, _actually_ behind their desk, before Zena would leave and stop trying to look for me to step me up on some time with her son. She _does_ realize I’m like, _three hundred years older_ than him, right?”

“I don’t think she cares very much,” Maria said. “ _She_ was the one who started everyone comparing me to Cassiel Navin, so. Tact comes second to getting Noah married.”

“But it’s her _husband,_ too,” Verity complained. “And her brother. And her mother. And her cousins that stuck around in the company. Why don’t they just have him marry into one of the further cousin branches? The MacCaulleys are doing really well for themselves still.”

“Maybe you could start dating someone,” she suggested. “Or get somebody to pretend to be dating you, so they’ll leave you alone. They might go to the MacCaulleys or someone else then.”

“But then they might go after _you_ again.”

“I have bodyguards,” Maria reminded him. “Emma would take them.”

“Emma _would_ take them,” Verity agreed. “Where _is_ your bodyguard, anyway?”

Maria pointed to the low, faux-stone _‘fence’_ that jutted out from the edge of the café a few feet away, which defined the edge of the dining area. There was a cat sunning on it.

“Ah,” Verity said. “Hello, Kommandant Filfaraskind.”

Domdruc opened one eye to look at him in brief acknowledgement.

“You said you were finishing up a final project for the company?” Maria asked.

“Yeah!” he said, brightening up at the thought. “It’s pretty fun, actually, I get to go into the family archives to look at all of _Apa_ ’s old stuff- but I have to strategize, since it’s the _family_ archives, I’ve been getting ambushed. But once they leave me and Noah alone in there it actually works out okay, because he can be my temporary assistant and go track down other things- you know there’s some stuff _Apa_ did for the company that nobody ever went back to after he left? There’s whole notebooks and files. A lot of it is theorizing about ideas before we really figured out how they worked, but now that we _do_ know more I’m actually finding that _Apa_ was on to a different aspect of a lot of magic. People focus a lot of affinities and that’s fine, but _he_ was fixing down resolutes at the time and did a couple of experiments- like there was stuff with burning different materials, that’s a popular mid-level theory lab _now_ but there’s something in it…”

Verity trailed off, a little chagrined.

“Well, I think he might have been on to something, that’s all,” he said. “When I leave the company I can’t take it with me and doing any more work on it will be tricky because of the agreements he signed when he left, but I might be able to continue parts of it. Even if I can’t, I’m leaving notes for whoever replaces me so _they_ can go and look at it, whatever good _that_ might do.”

“Why wouldn’t your notes do them any good?” Maria asked. “If you’re keeping them clearly and the person they replace you with is even a little competent-”

“It’s a security clearance issue,” Verity told her. “It wasn’t really an issue with me because they thought of me as _family,_ but _Apa_ ’s stuff is cross-referenced to some of Øystein Brynjarsson’s stuff, which is okay; but _they_ were also both working off Cassiel Navin. Øystein more than _Apa_ , but the things HabéTech still has of Navin’s are really tightly locked up. There are wards and everything- sealed files you’d have to get permission for, that sort of thing. I don’t even know everything they have of his, because there’s part of it no one will reply to my unlocking request for.”

“Shouldn’t you be able to work around that?” she said. “I mean, even if they’re just referencing it, you could do tests and experiments and stuff.”

“Yeah, but sometimes magic is so subjective and personal that it’s just not testable.”

Something clicked in her mind.

“Maria?” Verity asked, noting her expression.

“Nothing,” she told him. “I just had a thought. So HabéTech is keeping _locked files_ from Cassiel Navin? That sounds like a scandal waiting to happen.”

* * *

Having to decide if spy intrigue or witchcraft was the worse option was not something Buana had ever thought about happening in his life; but now that it had, he _really_ wished it hadn’t.

“I think this case just tied the Frankenstein-witch for top spot on our _‘Weirdest Investigations’_ list,” Aaliyah said when the Captain and the Sergeant had finished the last-minute meeting they’d called, right before everybody else was ready to break for the day.

“If it _is_ intelligence agencies having it out with each other,” Medeas said. “Or at least about galactic politics and not really murder, then can we classify this case as _‘not witchcraft’_ and leave FIO and the regular police to it?”

“I don’t think this case will ever be that simple,” the Captain told them tiredly. “Right now, I think the best we can hope for is to end up labeling this _‘Inconclusive- Not Suspect’_ , and then move on.”

“I, personally, would like to move on,” Shakti said. “I want a vacation. Things have been slow since we finished last case, and Medeas really needs to take some _medical leave._ ”

Xe shot xer spouse a look.

“I’m on indefinite desk duty!” they protested. “The most moving around I do all day is from the bullpen to the bus.”

“Well if you’d _stay home-_ ”

“Do you want me to call the herren Nandrike’s harke and ask what his father’s family was?” Zannah asked her fiancés.

Sergeant Beilschmidt sighed, and checked the time.

“No,” he told her. “It’s like two in the morning in Martigny. Do it first thing tomorrow.”

“So this is it for the day, then?”

“That’s it for the day,” Captain Liukasiewicz agreed. “Aaliyah, Buana, you’re on call tonight, don’t forget.” 

Everybody got up to leave. Night call duty meant Buana had a two-hour break for dinner, but then he had to come back into the bullpen until morning.

It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. The Auxiliary kept two cots for the nightly duty. If the regular officers needed you, they’d just wake you up.

“Come on, Buana,” Aaliyah told him. “I’ll show you the good dinner place I was telling you about. If you really like what you order, we can get it ordered take-out for a midnight meal.”

* * *

Feliciano had been watching his daughter all day as she argued with the Republicans about accepting a General to settle disputes with embedded Jäger in the police force. The Republicans wanted at least one of their police officials as counterbalance to whoever that might be, and Nia was trying to get them to drop the idea, to little success. The Republicans seemed to want a possible name for who the proposed General would be, but Nia was obviously walking around naming names.

That would have been just enough for some curiosity, and wondering how much the Hunt was already working on finding someone- expect he _knew_ that she was supposed to be accompanied for the next couple of days by Ivan, but he’d been absent today.

And then, during lunch, he’d made his usual daily call to his children, and Reno had told him that only Rosario was around, because Domdruc was out with Maria but _Emma_ was meeting with _FIO_.

So he’d resolved to grab his daughter after the meeting, except then _Forouzandeh_ asked her to stay after, and they talked very quietly in a corner when he wouldn’t leave the room.

“Are things okay?” he asked when they were done. “Nia, Reno said Emma went to go meet with FIO and Ivan wasn’t here today and now Forouzandeh-”

“There’s been some mess-up between FIO and the Kharad NCO Auxiliary,” she told him. “And it dragged Intelligence Special Operations into it because… connections.”

Feliciano knew not to press when people were vague about espionage. That sounded like state secrets, or at least an embarrassment or some situation that should stay quiet.

It was a relief, at least, to know that whatever it was, it likely wasn’t morally unsound. Nia was Jagdsprinz, and she could be a lot of unpleasant things personally, but she wouldn’t let the Hunt as a whole or in any institutionalized way get involved in the really nasty parts of political espionage that people usually tried to hide- assassinations, election-rigging, that sort of thing.

“Well,” he said. “Are you going to be okay?”

“As long as FIO manages to sort itself out.”

“No, Nia- I meant are _you_ going to be okay,” Feliciano said. “Because if you have trying to work the with Republicans and whatever’s going on with FIO and running the _Großjagdsreich_ generally, even if it’s a little remotely for now, that’s kind of a lot.”

“I’ve been doing this for six hundred and ninety-three years,” Nia snapped at him. “I’ve handled ruling countries _and_ managing the Hunt through _wars._ You think I can’t do manage _this?_ ”

“No,” he told her. “I know you can handle this. I know you have experience. But just because you can handle it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re okay. And-”

Twenty years ago he would have thought of this and not said it. Thirty years ago, he might not have thought of it; and if he had he would never have even _considered_ saying it, because they’d only just begun to try to talk again. Forty years ago, this whole situation would have been unthinkable.

But this was now.

“-Reno and Nadri aren’t the only children I have to worry about, Nia.”

“I don’t need you to worry about me,” she told him. It was a sullen statement, but the emotion in it was born from having to deal with a _parent._

“I know you don’t _need_ me to,” Feliciano said. “But it’s not like I can stop myself. You’re going to be in Martigny for Michaelmas, right? You should take the whole day off from _everything._ You’ve done really well and you deserve it.”

Nia still looked at him funny when he was nice to her. She never seemed to expect it, and that hurt a little. It wasn’t that she didn’t think he could be nice- he knew she knew better. It was that that surprise, the not-expecting, was so much like Ludwig.

It had taken _him_ a long time to accept people being nice to him, too. The reasons why weren’t really comparable but the psychological impulse was.

At least he could be thankful that Nia didn’t have to work her way up to _expecting_ people to be nice, too. Ludwig had never quite made it that far. Maybe if he’d had another ten or twenty years, he could have.

 “Do you want to come,” Nia said. It was more of a statement than a question, and Feliciano recognized this sort of thing pretty well now. This was how she talked when she was doing something she hadn’t actually thought out, in response to some sort of emotional impulse.

She hadn’t used to have this problem. When she’d been- before the being Jagdsprinz, she’d been comfortable with her emotions and acting on them. She’d lost that, somewhere.

“Come where?” Feliciano asked. He always tried to encourage her positive emotional impulses.

“To Michelmas services,” she told him. “At St. Michelmarc’s. You’re not really doing anything here anyway.”

“It would be nice to see Maria and Sebastian again.”

“They’re not coming,” Nia said. “They’re staying in Kharad. It’s me and Odette and Nico and Diana, and anyone else who shows up.”

“Well,” Feliciano said, giving her a smile. “My daughter-in-law and my nephew and his wife are good too. Thank you, Nia.”

* * *

“When I was talking to Verity today he said something and I figured out what was wrong with our experiment,” Maria told them. The four had managed to congregate in Reno’s room again, unobserved. “How are we supposed to know it _worked?_ ”

“Because it _happens?_ ” Nadri said.

“No, but what if you need like a- a time limit for this sort of magic to work?” she asked. “The other thing Reno did, it wasn’t a really _clear_ time limit but _‘once this had been explained’_ it pretty definite. There wasn’t anything like that in the one for Germany.”

“What’s the problem with it happening at any time?” Sebastian asked.

“It’s not that there’s a problem with it happening at _any_ time,” she said. “But if it can happen at _any time,_ what’s to keep it from occurring at the end of the universe, or something? That’s not useful at _all._ And even if it did happen within the next couple centuries, would anyone _tell_ us?”

“Of course they’d-”

“No,” Maria cut her brother off. “Why _would_ they? They’re all pretty private about their things, and if they were happier or made up but didn’t talk about it we’d never know. It’s not _testable._ Our variables aren’t good enough. It was a really nice idea but it was too broad and open and we got caught up in the possibility that Reno’s new sort of magic worked and the thought of making our families happy. We didn’t actually _plan it._ We need something that we’d definitely know about _and_ with a controlled time frame.”

“It has to be something nice,” Reno insisted.

“How’s solving a murder sound?” Maria asked him. “Emma has had to go to a bunch of meetings lately because of that üldrene that got killed. What if you wrote the Auxiliary solving the murder? That would make the news and we’d know. And if you say five days- because five is a good magical number- then we’d know _soon._ ”

Reno looked at her, mouth pursed, for a few long moments.

“Okay,” he said. “But I’m not writing any more until six days from now, when we know if it worked or not. Otherwise I might be leaving magical loose ends everywhere, and that could be a _disaster._ ”

* * *

_Let me tell you the story of the heroes who caught a murderer._

_On the first day, a day as today, the murderer made a fatal mistake._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Olivia Stratton I have seen your comment thank you it's beautiful I really like seeing it in my inbox so I'm going to hang onto it for a few more days, I promise I'm not ignoring you)


	3. The Fatal Mistake

“Jagdsprinz. _Jagdsprinz._ ”

“ _What_ Ivan fine I’m _awake_ what time is it?”

“No you are not,” Ivan told her. “It is one-thirty in the morning here and about ten o’clock at night in Kharad.”

Freiezuno _again._ Had someone cursed the damn place?

“What the fuck are they doing in Kharad _now?_ ”

“We have just heard from Don that Noah Honda-Brynjarsson was murdered,” Ivan said. “In the family archives. Verity Kirkland-Héderváry was with him, and it was reported it ten minutes ago.”

“You’re wrong,” Nia told him. “I’m _very_ awake. Do we know where János and Lana are? We should call them.”

“I called them before I woke you,” he said. “They have already left. They were on Uaclleon and so I asked Katyusha to take them.”

“So,” Nia said. “Ivan. If it’s 3 o’clock in the morning here, and János and Lana already know one of their sons was at the site of a murder-”

“He was also killed,” Ivan interrupted. “Security found him ten minutes ago, when they went to close up, on the floor in the archives with a cloth in his slit throat.”

“Wait, like-”

Nia mimed holding a scarf in both hands and pulling it against her throat.

“Exactly like.”

“He’s-” she said. “Hell, okay, could you move over, I’m actually going to get out of bed. János knows he can come talk to us, or hide out at the manor house or- whatever he needs, right?”

“I reminded him,” Ivan told her. “But I do not know what he and Lana plan to do.The Kharad NCO Auxiliary is also handling the case. The family archives have magical security in addition to the physical, so if someone got past that level…”

“If Kharad is going to keep blowing up like this, we’re going to have to give Damir more people.”

“And I have called Emma and the children are accounted for, and security will be tighter for the next few days.”

She hadn’t even-

Her _children_ were in Kharad. Maria _knew_ Verity Kirkland-Héderváry, and she’d met Noah Honda-Brynjarsson before.

“She says that Maria met Verity for a late lunch at around two o’clock in the afternoon local time,” Ivan said, and put a gentle hand on her arm to steady her into sitting back down on the bed. “Domdruc was with her the entire time, and she says he says there was nothing suspicious. It looks as though Verity was possibly in the wrong place at the wrong time, and whoever killed them were after Noah, or something in the archives.”

“Ivan,” Nia said. “Ivan, I don’t want my children-”

“Emma and Domdruc and Rosario will make sure they are safe,” he said. “And all four of them are more than capable of defending themselves, or running away, or both. _Breathe,_ Nia.”

His other hand went to her back, so she could feel the weight as she breathed in and out.

“What the _fuck_ are they doing in Kharad?” she demanded, more to distract herself than anything else. “That witch, then Irmari herren Nandrike and FIO’s security being breached, and now HabéTech’s been attacked in their own heart- what are they _doing?_ Did somebody _curse_ the whole damn city?”

“Do you want to call them?” Ivan asked.

“No, no, there’s no point,” Nia said. “They weren’t anywhere near it. This is just- this is me being paranoid and scared. There’s no _reason-_ ”

No, there _were_ reasons for someone to want to kill her children.

“-we have nothing to lead us to think that they’re being targeted. But somebody thought to use the Nation-killing trick on _Seelenkind_ to keep them- us- down _,_ and- Ivan I don’t want them hurt like that.”

“And they shall not be,” he told her firmly. “But right now you must breathe, and collect yourself; and then we should go to Venice and tell him so he is not taken by surprise.”

* * *

Neither of them had even thought about going to sleep yet when one of the regular officer sergeants pounded on the door of the bullpen and told them they had to come _immediately,_ somebody had killed the heir to HabéTech _in the building,_ and there were _Seelenkind_ involved.

Buana was hustled into a police cruiser alongside Aaliyah, who decided that this incident was too big to handle alone, and called the Sergeant and the Captain at home to tell them what was going on and ask them to show up at HabéTech headquarters.

Things were busy when they got there. Security had shut down the building, and the police presence was blocking up traffic, and people were stopping to stare and wonder what was going on. Probably there were some independent reporters in that crowd, and pretty soon the news media was going to be dispatching teams to find out what was going on.

He heard the whisper of _‘witchcraft’_ follow in their wake as the gathered public spotted them get out of the cruiser, and from the employees who were being held in their offices and on their floors.

The Honda-Brynjarsson family archive marked his second murder scene is as many weeks.

Noah Honda-Brynjarsson’s murder was different than Irmari herren Nandrike’s. There was a lot more blood here, and a lot more police. Half of the floor had been blocked off, but it didn’t really seem like it with the number of people around. There were a couple of crying people who were probably family, and some of the HabéTech security were being questioned by the regular police, presumable the ones who had found the body.

“There are two bodies,” Buana said, forcing himself to look at the murders, if only for a few seconds longer. If he was going to be stuck with the NCO Auxiliary, he _was_ going to have to get used to this, even if it made him want to sit down on the floor and cry, and then go hide somewhere. “Who else-”

“The _Seelenkind_ part,” Aaliyah told him gravely. “Buana, that’s Verity Kirkland-Héderváry.”

“Oh God.”

“Don’t panic,” she warned him. “I mean it, don’t panic.”

“I _can’t_ ,” he said faintly. “That’s _János Héderváry and Lana Kirkland’s son._ Somebody _killed_ their _son._ They thought they could _get away_ -”

“They can’t,” Aaliyah cut him off. “They’re not going to. Now we’re just going to sit tight until the Captain and the Sergeant get here, okay? So that’s the time you’ve got to pull yourself together.”

* * *

He hadn’t been this scared even when he’d _died_ for the first time. Granted, he hadn’t really had time to think about it, but it still, even some almost four hundred years later, seemed like an event he should have attached more emotion too.

That first death, though, he didn’t really remember. He remembered feeling himself die, and then the next time he was really conscious of what was going on and where he was the Hunt had swept through and Lana was telling him _he’d_ called the Jagdsprinz up and the assembled Honalenier Pagans were staring at him with no small terror.

Verity hadn’t gotten that chance.

The worst had happened, the thing he’d feared when he’d found out that Árpád had been missing on Theiostea for a whole year and a half, and he hadn’t been around to stop it.

“It’s not your fault,” Lana told him. They were in the elevator, going up to the archives. Katyusha had dropped them off inside the grounds, and their appearance had started a big commotion in the crowd. János had heard it, but hadn’t looked back to see who had shown up for the media circus this was sure to be.

“Did I say that out loud?”

“No,” she said. “But I was thinking it, so I figured you’d be thinking it too.”

Security had unlocked the elevator specially for them- it had been shut down as part of the building lockdown- but apparently someone had forgotten to tell the police because a bunch of people turned with hands going for weapons, or weapons out, when the doors opened.

János ignored them. The worst they could do was try to arrest him.

They hadn’t moved the bodies yet. They hadn’t even brought out the sheets yet. Verity was just _there,_ on the floor, with blood all down the front of his shirt from where someone had slit his throat, and-

The bile rose in János throat and he- he wanted _something,_ he wasn’t sure what, he’d lived so many centuries but he didn’t know this feeling. It could have been anger but he felt so numb at the same time-

Whoever had killed his son had jammed a cloth through the deep cut and tied it around the back; like he was a Nation to conquer and shut up in a basement somewhere until his people forgot about him, like was full-blooded _Seelenkind_ who could have come back from this, instead of just a little more than half from János’s full heritage and Lana’s one-forth, half-fey-

“ _Apa_.”

Oh no, _no-_ Edward shouldn’t be here, he shouldn’t be seeing this-

“Who-”

“Vasco heard, he told me,” his son told him. “You?”

“Ivan,” János said, and pulled his son down into a hug.

Lana came up to hug Edward from behind, and János freed a hand to grab one of hers, tightly.

* * *

At least _he_ hadn’t gone to bed yet. Hengda and Zannah had, but Damir had always gravitated to getting tired later in the night than most people, so he’d been up and totally awake when Aaliyah called.

He’d thought about going to get his husband and fiancée; but with a murder like this he’d probably end up out all night, and the Auxiliary would need at least one officer to be around and ready to go in the morning. So Hengda and Zannah got a series of notes in the bathroom, in the kitchen, and on the bedroom door- so they shouldn’t be able to miss _all_ of them- and then he called for a taxi to HabéTech headquarters.

He had to do more shoving than he would have liked to get to a regular officer who actually knew him on sight and would help him get through security, but eventually Damir got up to the archives and connected with Aaliyah and Buana.

“Good to see you sir,” Aaliyah greeted him. “We were waiting on you to get properly started.”

“So what _have_ you got, then?”

“Not a whole lot- just the crime scene so far. You can go look, they haven’t started to block it off yet since it’s mostly just police and security up here. It looks like both of them were knifed.”

Damir did go to look at the crime scene. The bodies had been moved in the time it had taken him to get over here, but Aaliyah pointed out where they had been in the blood pools and described how they’d been found- Verity closer to the door, on this stomach, like he’d been killed from behind; and Noah further into the room and face-up, like he’d turned around to see what was going on.

“ _Both_ of them were knifed?” he asked. “No shootings?”

“No, sir,” she told him.

“They have cameras in here, right?”

“Pretty sure somebody’s on that.”

“Well can you go find out? And send Buana over here.”

He waited in place for his Sorcery Officer to come to him.

“Has the magical security been broken?” Damir asked him.

“I- I don’t know, sir.”

“You can’t tell or you haven’t checked yet?”

Buana suddenly looked very panicked and Damir knew exactly which one it was without him having to say a thing.

“It’s okay,” he said. “Just- take a couple deep breaths, and check, then tell me what you find, okay?”

He took a second look at the crime scene while Buana skittered off to do his job. There were two distinct blood pools, but the one where Verity had been looked smaller than Noah’s.

Damir tried to tell himself that it was nothing; but the voice in the back of his head was quietly insinuating that Irmari herren Nandrike’s murder had made the news, as well as why the NCO Auxiliary was looking into it, so there was no reason someone couldn’t have gotten ideas.

Beyond the blood, on the reading table, there were a lot of documents out.

He stepped carefully around the blood to take a look at them. There were a smattering of loose sheets of very old, fragile-looking paper that must have been treated or magicked somehow to keep them together; but most of them were encased in clear protective sheets in a thick archival folio that was lying open on the table. None of them were in any language he recognized, so he closed the folio carefully, marking where it had been open with a hand, to see what it was.

 _‘Notes on the Development and Implementation of the_ Enlightenment _and the_ ANV Ludovico Manin, _2047-2053 and 2081-2109. Cassiel Navin, Øystein Brynjarsson, János B Héderváry.’_

Damir even more carefully replaced the folio to the page it had been on. These were very, very old pieces of important paper; and they might be clues. Maybe Noah and Verity had walked in on the killer, who’d come to look at these.

He needed someone to tell him what specifically was in here, and what the loose sheets were. He went back out to the archive lobby and the hallway to see if there was an archivist around who might know, and found someone even better.

Well, in a way.

“Sorcerer Héderváry?” Damir asked quietly, once he’d reached the little family gathering in a corner of the lobby. “Sergeant Beilschmidt, Kharad NCO Witchbreaker Auxiliary. I’m sorry to disturb and I’m very sorry about your son, but back in the archives there are some papers out from your time with the company. Could you come tell me what’s in them? It might be important.”

János Héderváry looked up from the floor.

“Yeah, I can come look,” he said. “A minute?”

“Of course, sir.”

Damir gave him the minute, moving off a little so it didn’t seem like he was being pushy. Sorcerer Héderváry and a woman who must have been Sorceress Kirkland were leaning into each other on the bench in a sort of emotional exhaustion he knew from other murder scenes. The other man with them bore enough family resemblance that Damir figured it was one of their other sons.

It was a bit more than a minute when Sorcerer Héderváry did finally get up, his- wife? Damir didn’t know if the two of them had ever gotten married or not- keeping her hand in place to trail from his shoulder down the length of his arm as he stood, for a comforting hand-squeeze at the end; but he wasn’t about to push anyone to go back to a live crime scene if they weren’t police or Jäger.

“These are mine,” Sorcerer Héderváry told him, when they got to the table and he looked at where the folio had been left open. “They must have unbound my journals to take care of the pages easier, because I remember doing this. HabéTech- Navin Technologies had just been contracted by Venice to build the _Ludovico Manin,_ but I didn’t know anything about space ships, so I went to talk to Oystein Brynjarsson so he could explain the basics to me, and what they wanted me particularly to do. These are notes from that.”

He turned the page.

“See,” he said, pointing at a sketched diagram. It looked like it had been copied off of a much more detailed blueprint, and it wasn’t particularly technical. “Øystein wanted me to see if I could make the engines better, for a start, so I made a sketch of where he wanted me to work. And then this-”

He pointed to the page opposite, which had been taken up by a full-page table, with lines so straight a ruler must have been used.

“-these are Cassiel’s results from the basic theory tests that I copied out, and then the numbers from the _Enlightenment,_ so I’d have the information for comparison.”

“Is there anything in here that could have been useful for industrial espionage?” Damir asked. “Maybe if your son and Noah surprised someone in here-”

“No,” Sorcerer Héderváry told him. “All this is considered basics now, if it’s not horrendously outdated. It’s harder to get permission to see the original documents than just about anything else here, but you don’t have to go through that to get this information. It’s all been public domain for centuries. You can find it in the computer network.”

“So why would they be out, then?”

“Verity- he was going to leave the company in ten days,” Sorcerer Héderváry told him. “He was finishing up some project he was referencing my old notes for, I don’t know what. He-”

His paused.

“He was supposed to come _home._ ”

Damir stayed quiet to give the other man a moment, and took his own notes from what he’d been told.

“What about the loose papers?” he asked, after it didn’t seem like it would be rude any longer.

“This is all Cassiel- see, he’s doodled all over the edges,” Sorcerer Héderváry said, tracing the strongly geometric lines of doodles. Some of them seemed pretty complicated to Damir, but that was probably genius for you. Considering Cassiel Navin was almost better-known as _‘the Prideful’_ , in much the same way that Sorcerer Héderváry was _‘the Wanderer’_ , the man had probably _wanted_ to make even something like his doodling more complex than everyone else’s, just to prove he could. “That’s how you can tell without knowing what his handwriting looks like. He must have been in meetings. I’d forgotten he always used to do that.”

Damir took some pictures of the loose papers, and wondered if it was worth it to try to claim the contents of the reading table as evidence and take it all back to the station. Even if it _was_ necessary, it wasn’t like they had proper archival capabilities for seven-hundred-year-old paper.

He was going to ask Sorcerer Héderváry to tell him what the loose papers were about, but Sorcerer Héderváry frowned a bit, looked around, grabbed the edge of the table, and then said: “Don’t let me fall over.”

* * *

They hadn’t gone to bed yet when Rosario came around and checked all the locks on the windows, pulled the curtains, and set the magical security on the rooms from the passive recording of everyone and everything that crossed the boundary of _‘home’_ to the active defenses, which would block anyone from sending their shadow spirit in or out and snag them if they tried to break through; and should anyone physically try to come in who was unmarked as accepted by the wards, start applying an unrelenting dread that would swiftly ramp up to paralyzing fear if they didn’t leave.

It wasn’t quite the level of emergency conditions, but it was getting close.

“What happened?” Sebastian asked. Maria was in his room for the moment, to help him with the math he had to do.

“Someone’s killed Noah Honda-Brynjarsson in his family’s archives,” Rosario told them, running his fingers down the etched copper rod the magical security was anchored to in this room. “Verity Héderváry was in there with him so we’re going to be more vigilant than usual for the next day or so, okay? So no leaving until classes in the morning.”

Maria had gone tense at the mention of Verity’s name, but Sebastian waited until Rosario had left to get up and close the door to his room again.

“Maria,” he told his sister quietly. “He’s _Seelenkind._ I’m sure he’s fine.”

“No, Verity’s _not Seelenkind,_ ” she said, curling up a little on herself. “Not like _us._ Sorceress Kirkland is only _Seelenkind_ because she’s half-Tylwyth too, she wouldn’t have been magical at _all_ if it wasn’t for that. If they got Verity- if he’s really hurt-”

“If you want to try out that trick you thought up,” Sebastian said. “I can go over there and look.”

Maria took a loud breath and nodded, and started rummaging around in Sebastian’s magic kit to find bronze and gold wire. She cut off a very long, equal length of both while Sebastian moved his books away and sat cross-legged on his bed, back to the door.

His sister came up to sit opposite him and handed him an end of both wires to hold. He kept them in place while she twisted them around to make a thicker cord, and then secured one end around his wrist.

Sebastian closed his eyes and stepped out of his body. Just as they’d hoped, the magical part of the wire cord came with him. He reached over and pulled at the other end of the cord.

It came free of the physical part that Maria was holding, and that’s where things got a bit weird, because the magical part was still a part of the physical part, even as he gently felt around his sister’s soul and tied the free end of the magical cord around the part of her magic closest to _‘herself’_ , where- he thought, at least; nobody had ever been able to point to specific areas on the different parts of souls and say something like _‘that’s where being a Nation is!’_ , but it made sense to _him,_ looking at people- her inborn talent, the innate navigation, should be.

Sebastian tugged the magical cord.

“I felt that,” Maria said aloud, and actually looked straight at where he was, even though she couldn’t see him.

That was the first hurdle done, then- a link and communication between someone going walking as their shadow soul, and someone who had the same spiritual awareness of themselves as a rock.

“Ready to go?” Maria asked; and after a moment he took to settle himself he tugged twice- the prearranged _‘yes’_ signal, from when they’d first theorized about this, back when they’d learned what their security measures were like.

It wasn’t that they _wanted_ to ditch their security. They knew it was there for their own protection, which was pretty good reason to have it around- but it was interesting to think about. To see if they could do it.

And right now it was looking like they _could_ do it.

This next part was the trickiest, because there wasn’t even really theory to go on, or any reason to expect that it would work except a history of them being able to do things that maybe shouldn’t have reasonably worked, or at least worked for anyone else.

Maria shunted him out of the universe, into the nothingness-chaos on the other side of the edge of reality.

His sister had said that it didn’t matter if they weren’t in the Shining City, at the actual physical border of the edge of reality; and Sebastian had believed her, mostly because he’d had no other choice in the matter. _She_ was the one who’d touched the edge of creation, listened to sung truths of the power in all the boundaries of the universe, looked back over her shoulder at reality from the wrong side- she knew what she was doing, and he didn’t. Maria would trust him- _had_ trusted him- to have the same extensive knowledge of souls. Sebastian couldn’t, in all rules of politeness and the fair trade and contracts their _Elti_ embodied in a way most people didn’t really try to understand, do any less in return.

Maria had said that it didn’t matter if they weren’t in the Shining City because every part of reality was always on a boundary with not-reality because… reasons, as far as Sebastian could tell. She’d explained it at least five times, but he just hadn’t understood. Probably, it was something you just couldn’t understand unless you’d seen it, maybe even experienced it.

 _That,_ Sebastian understood. He couldn’t properly describe how the universe looked from the perspective of his shadow soul, either. Other people who had gone walking out of their bodies understood just perfectly, even when he couldn’t find good or proper words, or even _any_ words; but nobody who hadn’t had ever gotten more than a general shape of the experience, though he’d used the very simplest parts and the easiest words to do the explaining with.

He looked- well, _‘down’,_ technically-speaking in the framework of existing in reality; but he wasn’t there now, so Maria had said it wasn’t _actually_ down he just didn’t understand that it wasn’t down and that the barrier meant to trap anyone who tried to send their shadow soul into or out of the house wasn’t _actually_ below his feet because he wasn’t existing in the same place as it, he could just see it like he was, and even that was a lie because the barrier was spherical around the house to offer total protection and he’d gone around it from the inside.

Taking things on faith was an essential skill in magic, sometimes. The four of them had gotten very good at it.

Sebastian took a step and jerked the cord up-and-down in a sharp, quick motion. If the other end had been loose, it would have moved like a whip and cracked; but anchored, the wave motion was the _‘move me’_ signal.

Maria shunted him back into reality on the other side of the security barrier, and the cord held. Sebastian tugged it twice to tell his sister that, yes, it had worked; and walked over to HabéTech headquarters.

The building itself hadn’t put up anti-shadow-soul protections, because the only people who really knew how to do it were sündeyalacgh and they had more important and interesting things to do than industrial espionage.

The archives, however, were a different matter. Someone had set up a barrier here- not the same as their security, which was meant to trap someone trying to spirit walk through it, but one that was just meant to _block._ He’d have to force his way through it, since he didn’t have permission to go through, and that would mean breaking the barrier.

Which he wasn’t going to do, because that might set off alarms and even if it didn’t it would shatter the barrier, and mess up the crime scene. The barrier here blocked both passage into the archives and his ability to _‘see’_ what was going on as just his shadow soul, but there were police walking back and forth across the barrier line effortlessly in their physical bodies, and an NCO Auxiliary Sorcery Officer kept crossing in and out of view. He was clearly checking the barrier and the other security measures, at least as best he could without actually being sündeyalacgh and being able to just _look_ at the magic, but Sebastian wasn’t about to mess with the NCO Auxiliary.

He sent the motion wave back to Maria, and hoped she’d get the idea that she needed to shunt him back in and out again here, to pass this barrier. They hadn’t ever discussed something like this, but she _should_ be able to pinpoint exactly where he was and get the idea-

Sebastian didn’t get any warning of it. After a minute or two of waiting- _‘radio silence’_ , as it were, though Maria wasn’t equipped to send any messages back along the cord anyway- he was shunted back into the nothingness-chaos.

Maria had definitely gotten the idea that there was another security barrier to cross, because they replicated the first successfully bypass here, and Sebastian got into the archives.

It was pretty clear that two people had been killed, here. The first indication were the two dying pools of the blood, but the impression of recent death hadn’t smoothed out yet, either. Sebastian didn’t know what Verity’s soul had looked like, but it was clear that somebody with a lot of power had made an attempt at some kind of death-curse; but hadn’t had quite enough time to pull it off. The unfinished form of it was sitting there, vaguely malevolent.

In the normal course of things, it would be Sebastian’s duty as a trained sündeyalacgh- even if he’d never claimed the title- to disperse it in case it latched onto someone just passing by, or ambient or worked magic interacted with it enough to give it a new and unpredictable form; but that might have counted as disturbing the evidence. He still would have done it himself, but he’d have to inform the police of what he was going to do and he didn’t have any good way to explain how he’d gotten in, and didn’t particularly want to face the police when he hadn’t actually been invited in. That seemed like a good way to get in trouble.

Thankfully, Sorcerer Héderváry was here.

Sebastian hesitated a second after deciding to hand the problem over to his old teacher, suddenly worried that he’d be hurt having to clean up after his own son’s death-curse; and in that second he spotted something strange in the archives.

The table Sorcerer Héderváry- and oh, that was _Damir_ with him, good- was standing by was in an open space between a thin dividing wall and a freestanding set of metal drawers and shelves, which were filled with records. This was basically all paper and not magical all at except for a very faint goldish-green glow in some of the sketched plans of old ritual magic experiments where they’d drawn ambient magic into their patterns. It probably wouldn’t be live or dangerous for centuries yet if it had taken them _this_ long to get even that much magic, but Sebastian hoped that someone was paying attention to it, just in case.

But beyond the paper, through the traceries of other magic, there was a solid, complicated knot of bright gold-green. It was strangely darkened, like he was seeing it through a sheer black veil, but he’d seen that effect before. That meant someone had locked it behind iron or steel to keep it blocked from the surrounding magic. The fact that it had enough magic wrapped up in it to still shine like that, though-

Sebastian was impressed. He reached through the other magic and the cabinets to pick up the knotted magic of this… well, looking at it closely, he could tell it was a number of spells all worked together in the same place. It took a cube form, about as wide on a face as the side of his fist, and there was a different spell for each face. This surface level was very intricate, but nothing compared to the way the parts of the spells twisted and tied together on the inside of the cube to make one cohesive artifact.

He resisted trying to follow the inside paths with his eyes, or a finger, or really trying to make any sense of them at all, like this. He wasn’t _exactly_ sure what the cube-spell did, but the general purpose of it was clear in its form. The labyrinthine tangle of it tugged at it him ever-so-slightly if he really concentrated on it. This was a magical trap of some sort, and he wasn’t properly protected against getting caught to-

_“ **Ludwig Sebastian Beilschmidt** what the **hell** are you doing here.”_

Sebastian jumped, startled, and looked over his shoulder.

Sorcerer Héderváry had come out walking, and was looking at him coldly, furiously- he hadn’t done anything to let his teacher know he was here, was he really that sensitive to-

No, Sebastian realized. When he’d picked up the magical part of the spell-cube he’d moved the part of it its box was supposed to be shielding. The change of the surrounding magic in response the new, sudden presence would have been detectable to anyone used to paying attention to the ambient magical background of the universe.

“Rosario said that someone murdered Noah and Verity was here and Maria was worried about Verity so I came to see,” he told Sorcerer Héderváry. “I- I told her he’d be okay.”

“This is an _active crime scene!_ And you just _come in here_ and mess up the security trails-”

“I _didn’t,_ ” Sebastian protested, and pointed back behind him at the spirit-walking barrier. “I _know_ better, Sorcerer Héderváry; I went around. Maria’s helping me.”

“Of _course_ she is,” Sorcerer Héderváry muttered, disgusted, and glanced at the barrier to make sure it really was still intact. “Someday, you _children_ are going to get somebody hurt with the way you just- _do things,_ and it’s even odds it will be someone who wasn’t involved at all.”

“We don’t just _‘do things’_ ,” Sebastian said. “We _do_ actually think about them first.”

“No you don’t,” Sorcerer Héderváry snapped at him. “You know how I know? Because if you were _actually **thinking,**_ you would have _called_ instead of messing around with magic! _You_ just wanted to do _this_ instead.”

“Well it _worked,_ ” Sebastian said. “And now Maria and I know it does, so we learned something. And I found out that Verity tried to death-curse someone and that needs to be cleaned up, so it was a good thing I came out here.”

“It is _not,_ ” his old teacher. “ _You-_ ”

He froze, suddenly; and Sebastian realized that he was staring at the cube-spell he was holding.

“Where did you get that.”

“It was in the drawer,” Sebastian told him, inclining his head at the right one. “In a box. Iron or steel. You know what it is?”

“I have more than half a mind to stuff you in it so you get a good scare and a lesson in what _‘doing things to see if you can’_ will do to you and everyone around you!” Sorcerer Héderváry half-snarled at him. “Put that back and get _out._ ”

Sebastian replaced the magic and signaled for Maria to shunt him back around the barrier as soon as Sorcerer Héderváry had gone back to his body. He was already in a bad enough mood without maybe being able to figure out some of Maria’s secrets.

* * *

János left the table as soon as he was back in his body to yank open the drawer Sebastian had pointed out to him. There was a book-sized box inside, made of all iron. He heaved it out and dropped it heavily on the table, which shook a little at the impact.

“Sorcerer Héderváry?” Sergeant Beilschmidt asked, sounding hesitant and confused.

“János?” Lana asked- she must have come in while he’d been busy with Sebastian. “What’s this?”

“Something that shouldn’t still exist,” he said, and used a skill he’d learned from Øystein to melt through the lock mechanism, steel where everything else was iron.

Sitting in the box, securely packed in centuries-old foam, was Cassiel’s paperweight- the thing he’d bound Austria and the demon Belial to.

He hadn’t gotten a good look at it when Nia had led the raid on Cassiel’s workshop, and he didn’t appreciate getting a good look at it now. He was _certain_ that this fell under the category of things Nia had ordered destroyed- what had happened to it after she and the Jäger and the Vatican and Romania left? Who’d she given it to to have destroyed? Tomoko? Ásdís? Øystein? Csaba? Akane?

_Who hadn’t destroyed this?_

János was furious at just the sight of it, the emotion hot and welcome after the numb fog of knowing Verity was dead. Nia and Cristoforo and Nico might have banished the demon and unbound his father from the cast metal, but Cassiel’s binding spells were still etched onto the surface of it, and most of the magic was still in it-

If they still had _this,_ what _else_ were they hiding?

He didn’t step out of his body for this, though he could have. It was more satisfying to gather in the ambient magic around him and let it out in a burst across the room, and sense the spots of massed magic in the archives light up.

János started with the drawer the box had come from. There were a number of magically-sealed folios in it, and he pulled them all out and dumped them on the table, shuffling through them to see the authors.

_Cassiel Navin Cassiel Navin Cassiel Navin Cassiel Navin-_

The drawers all around the one that had held the box were locked, and he spared a moment to wonder if that meant that the murderer had been looking into this drawer specifically; not even a second to ask for a key. He melted through all the drawer locks like he had the box.

“Sir,” Sergeant Beilschmidt trying to say to him. “ _Sir._ You’re destroying private property and I have to ask you to stop. I know this is an emotional time-”

“This isn’t about me being _emotional,_ ” János hissed at him. “This is about whether or not I call the Jagdsprinz and accuse the Honda-Brynjarsson family of possessing illegal information that would let them perpetrate witchcraft!”

The Sergeant, NCO _Witchbreaker_ Auxiliary that he was, shut up and retreated. János went striding up and down the other aisles, after ascertaining that the drawers nearest to the table were full of Cassiel Navin’s papers, unsecured and not; but found no other folios with his cousin’s name on them.

Lana had followed him the whole way through his walk, and leaned into him when they came back to standing at the table.

“Jansci,” she said quietly. “Please?”

“That’s-”

He was too _angry_ to want to talk.

“That _thing,_ ” he told her. “That box, the _cube._ That’s what Cassiel used on my _father_ and the _demon._ It’s to bind _souls,_ Lana! And there’s all these magically-locked records with his name on them-”

“We’ll open them, then,” Lana said, and picked up the nearest one.

Most of the things, János recognized. A few were more notes related to space, but mostly it was miscellany, the record of Cass jumping from project to project and idea to idea.

Back when Csaba had been alive, he wouldn’t have been able to follow most of this. But age was just as good as genius when you were measuring it in centuries of experience, and he knew exactly what Cassiel had been up to, now.

The way his notes kept _just_ skating around the edges of witchcraft would have been utterly infuriating, if he hadn’t already been so angry about the binding cube. Cassiel had been getting away with _so much-_

In one thin folio, labeled _‘Uncategorized Notes, 2079-2089. Cassiel Navin,’_ was-

That had been the last decade of the man’s life, and somewhere halfway through it he’d summoned and bound the demon Belial. The signs of it János had missed back then were glaringly obvious in the vague notes now, a product of hindsight and sündeyalacgh training about the soul and knowledge gleaned from Lanka Kubera’s libraries and almost seven centuries of practical experience and advances in magical science and theory.

“Blitzen,” he said to his companion AI. “Get me the Jagdsprinz.”

A few seconds, and-

“Idunn says she’s busy but if you give her a minute-” Blitzen started to tell him.

“Oh no,” János cut him off. “Tell her to tell the Jagdsprinz: _‘demon-summoning-’_ ”

He jabbed his finger onto the part of the notes in question.

“ _‘-necromancy-’_ ”

Another jab.

“ _‘-interfering with Kings-’_ ”

One last jab.

“ _‘-in the HabéTech archives.’_ If she doesn’t get over here-”

* * *

Buana had done his best to check the security, but he didn’t actually have any training in this beyond the police academy basics they gave to every sorcerer who came through. He could tell that there were anti-scrying wards in place- which wasn’t at all relevant to the case they were working, probably- and the standard passive recording of the impression of everyone who walked over any of the thresholds, but that wasn’t really helpful, either.

Or rather, _he_ wasn’t helpful, because he’d done port security training and so his magical forensics was about limited to the basics of identifying the common types of magic, identifying contraband items, and tracking or finding magical signatures on people.

If he knew _which_ of the impressions was the murderer’s, he should be able to do something with _that-_ but he didn’t know, and there was one very worrying _fuzzy_ impression that seemed to be someone’s attempt to get around this part of the security. No one but a criminal would try to do that, Buana figured; but when he’d tried to get a hold on the impression to use it for something, he’d only managed to backtrack it through the hall and down half a flight of stairs before the already-fuzzy impression was totally obscured by the passages of other people before and since then.

And Sorcerer Héderváry was _here_ and he was _angry_ and storming around in the archives and Buana didn’t want to go anywhere near him, so he was the first person Aaliyah found when she came back from checking on security.

“What’s going on in there?” she asked, looking into the archives.

“I don’t know he’s being snappy at the Sergeant and tearing things apart-”

“Sergeant’s not busy with him?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Good,” Aaliyah said, and actually _went into_ the archives to get him.

And that, Buana reflected glumly, was why she and Sergeant Beilschmidt had _volunteered_ for the NCO Witchbreaker Auxiliary. They’d stay in a room with one of the most powerful sorcerers in the galaxy when he was angry, without looking at all concerned about it.

At least they both came back out to regroup, rather than calling _him_ in.

“I think this is going to get kicked up to the Witchbreakers very soon,” the Sergeant told them. “So we’ll all get to go home and sleep. Well, I’ll get to go home and try to get to sleep again. Buana, what’s the magical security look like?”

Buana told the Sergeant what he’d found.

“Hey, it’s okay,” the Sergeant said when he was done. “Sometimes you just don’t come up with anything.”

Aaliyah seemed less at ease with this.

“Somebody blocked their magical impression in the security?”

“I didn’t know it could happen, either,” Buana admitted.

“No,” she said. “It’s not- sir, Sergeant, I tagged along with the ROs going to look at the security footage and you can’t see the murderer on it.”

“So this had a lot of planning in it,” the Sergeant replied, starting to think aloud. “If they knew where-”

“ _No,_ sir. We know exactly where they were in the room. It’s very obvious with the way files get taken out of drawers and how Honda-Brynjarsson and Kirkland-Héderváry are killed. But _you can’t see the person doing it._ ”

The Sergeant was very quiet for a few moments.

“Investigator Gaylord,” he said. “Congratulations, you’ve just proved witchcraft in this murder. This is no longer our business, and I’m going to call Witchbreaker Leutnant Harshaisha to take over here. You and Buana and go back to the station, I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Sir,” Aaliyah said faintly, and Buana followed her line-of-sight to see where she was looking and _immediately_ wished he hadn’t, oh God. “I’m not sure you’ll have to go so far as to call Leutnant Harshaisha.”

The yelling started not two seconds later.

* * *

“There is _what_ in here?” Nia demanded. “ _What the fuck,_ János! You were supposed to have gotten rid of all this!”

“In his _workshop,_ I did!” János yelled right back. “And it wasn’t like I was really- _there_ at the time, Nia! I was in _shock!_ I did my best, and then when I got back to the company I told Tomoko and Øystein and Ásdís and Csaba to look through the papers _I’d_ already picked up and Cassiel’s stuff everywhere else, and destroy anything that had demon things on it! I have _no idea_ who didn’t do that, because I never looked at any of his personal stuff again the entire time when I was with the company!”

He pointed to the table, and Cassiel’s binding spells.

“And _that_ wasn’t my responsibility, Nia! _You_ were the last person with that! Why didn’t _you_ destroy it?”

“The only thing I could think of was melting it down!” she told him. “And I didn’t know if the magic would still be in it or not or if there was special way you had to do it safely! I thought Øystein would know, so I gave it to _him!_ ”

They spent a couple of moments glaring at each other, and then Nia forced herself to close her eyes and take a deep breath. Calm down- Nico and Odette and _Zio_ Cris and Ivan would tell her she was misdirecting her emotions again if they were here.

“It’s not really your fault,” she said, talking herself through it. “And it’s not really mine, either. There was no reason you should have wanted to go back to Cassiel’s things or expect any of them not to do as you asked, just as there wasn’t any for me. And it doesn’t do any good to try to blame one of them or any of them when they’re dead because unless there’s a piece of paper somewhere that one of them wrote saying something like _‘I found these things Cassiel Navin did and they’re witchcraft but I’m going to keep them’_ we’re never going to know who it was.”

“But _someone_ decided to keep it,” János argued, deflating a bit now that he wasn’t being yelled at it turn. “ _Someone_ had to have found this and told the people in charge of the archives, or one of the family; and then someone _there_ must have made the decision, at _least_ once, not to get rid of them or report that they were here.”

“Yeah, and I’m going to make sure we know if there’s in anyone in charge here who’s alive for questioning did something like that,” Nia told him. “And I’m going to have this archive searched paper by paper by the Witchbreakers for anything else, by Cassiel Navin or not, that should be destroyed. But-”

She glanced around, and dropped her voice just a bit even though Lana was the only other person around. They’d been yelling in German, and there wasn’t anyone here who would have understood any of it but Lana; but she wanted anyone who might come over to know that they were having a moment.

“-you and Lana know that you come to me and Nico if you need anything, right?” she asked. “Support, a place to run away- you’re welcome to go hide out in the manor house for a while, you and your sons. And I’m going to give Árpád and Terenzia leave for a while. Or if you want the horse farm I can tell everyone else to take a bit off- you still do own it and I don’t mind ignoring the lease for however long you need. Or you could come to the Jagdshall, I can find room. Or Prarayer- anywhere you want in the _Großjagdsreich,_ okay?”

“Thanks, Nia,” János said, and suddenly he sounded very tired. “I don’t know- we hadn’t talked about it yet.”

“They haven’t given us a time to claim- to go down to the morgue yet,” Lana said. “We already did the official identifying, but we- funerals, you know. And we don’t know if he’d drawn up a will or where we’d bury him if he didn’t already leave instructions for a place…”

“Anything you need,” Nia reiterated firmly. “I mean it.”

“We know,” János told her, and suddenly switched into to Farsuà. “Do you need something, Sergeant?”

“Just _Tante,_ ” she heard Damir say, and turned to look at him.

“Find something?” she asked.

“I had one of my Investigators find out what was on the security footage,” he said. “She said they picked up everything about the rummaging through the archives and the murder but the murderer.”

“Damir,” Nia said. “Are you telling me that there was a _Distawydwr_ in here?”

“Well, I can’t say for sure that whoever it was was _actually Distawydwr,_ ” her great-grandnephew told her. “But my Sorcery Officer says that someone came through the passive barrier with a personal impression so fuzzed it’s impossible for him to track- no don’t look at him! He’s new, _Tante,_ and he’s half-terrified of _me;_ if you look at him he’ll probably faint.”

Nia stopped turning her head to look about halfway through the arc and went back to looking at him.

“Your Sorcery Officer needs to toughen up some, then,” she told Damir.

“It’s not his fault, _Tante,_ ” he said. “His representative in the Imperial Congress did politicking and got him appointed here, he wanted to be Port Security. He’s not suited for this job or really trained for it and he knows it. But we’re managing.” 

“That shouldn’t have happened,” she told him.

“Yeah, I know, _Tante._ ”

“Where in the archives was this person looking around in?” János asked him.

“I don’t know, sir- Investigator Gaylord!”

The woman who came over had the look of a seasoned NCO Auxiliary officer to her, and Nia decided to do her best to remember her. Some NCO Captains and Sergeants came to the Auxiliary straight into that position, but more had been Investigators first who’d sat for promotion exams. Any Investigator could take those, but there was weight given if they’d been recommended for it, as well. Nia had feeling this Investigator Gaylord would do well, if she wanted to sit for the exam, and she could suggest that Damir recommend her later.

“It was that drawer there,” the woman said once Damir had asked her about the footage, and pointed to a drawer right next to the table.

“The _box_ was in that one,” János said.

That was probably a very bad sign.

“Where are the Honda-Brynjarssons?” Nia asked Damir.

“I haven’t seen them-”

“The regular officers said they were here earlier, Your Majesty,” Investigator Gaylord spoke up.

“ _‘Sir’_ ,” Nia corrected her automatically.

“Sir,” she changed to. “Apparently they all vanished when we turned up, which is why they told me about it.”

“János, does that sound suspicious to you?”

“ _Hell_ yes.”

“Good,” Nia said, and summoned the Jagdsprinz’s armor, flipping the faceplate of her Helm in and out of existence. She’d arrived in her dress uniform, but beyond a difference in patches, a bit more gold, and her sword where an officer’s knife was supposed to be, it didn’t look a lot different than any other Hunt dress uniform. She wouldn’t stand out as anything but _‘Jager’_ and it would take a knowledge of uniform markings most people didn’t have memorized to know who exactly she was. Usually she liked it that way, but right now she wanted everyone to _know_ that Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor was _here,_ and hunting. No one was going to mistake the brigandine, or the big fur cloak. “Bring the box, I’ll grab some papers, we’re going to find your absentee descendants and terrorize them a little bit.”

Her cloak was too heavy to flare out dramatically behind her as she and János strode the corridors, searching for the Honda-Brynjarssons, but the way everyone who saw her coming immediately got out of the way was… nice.

Of course, the feeling of liking feeling powerful was followed shortly by vague republican guilt and the more concrete guilty half-certainty that she was shaming her _Vati_ by being authoritarian and imperial- but she’d had a couple seconds, and she could chase off some of the guilt by sternly reminding herself that she was doing her _job._

“Remind me who they all are again,” she said to János. She knew he kept tabs on his descendants, the same way that Ivan did for his and Nico did for his sibling’s lines, but she’d never started. So much of her family was in the Hunt or similarly functionally immortal that she hadn’t really had a good incentive to ever start.

“Zena is Noah’s mother,” János told her. “Not married and she’s the only one who knows who his father is, which is probably why she’s the most marriage-mad of all of them. She was trying to get Verity-”

Nia gave him a second.

“Her brother Abel is married, though,” he continued, a few moments later. “His wife is Deliah, who was Deliah Habicht-Misra before she got married.”

“I know that name, that’s a Martigner family. I’m pretty sure I’ve got a Generalleutnant Habicht-Misra somewhere.”

“They’ve got a daughter, Alexandra. She’s… five or six, I think.”

“Well, won’t need to talk to her then.”

The Honda-Brynjarssons weren’t up in the executive offices, and Nia didn’t know quite what to make of that. Either they’d gone home, or they were just in different parts of the building handling the people who worked in headquarters here instead of calling out to different offices around the galaxy.

“Zena and Abel’s parents are dead,” János told her as she looked over the floor directory next to the elevators, trying to find a likely place to search next. “But their uncle Jonas-”

“ _‘Jonas’_?”

“It’s a _family_ name,” János grumbled. “I _know,_ I wish they’d stop too, but Ida Alexandra and Akane and Tomoko were the only other ones with names that could be unobtrusively used again or switched to something similar. Like Jonas- one of his sisters, Zena and Abel’s mother, she was Tom; the other one was Cana. Anyway, Jonas is still alive, and his three kids are too- Lisle, Gareth, and Deena. None of them had kids last time I checked, but Gareth is in charge of the archives.”

“Then I’ll have to see _him_ ,” Nia said, and decided to start in middle management, twenty floors down. János had to ask Blitzen to quietly unlock the elevator so they weren’t taking stairs the whole way down.

“And then there’s Georgette, who’s Jonas and Cana’s mother, and her sister Jean,” János finished once they were in the elevator. “Jonas, Cana, and Zena control the company, Zena more so lately than the other two; but Georgette and Jean are the ones in charge of the _family._ ”

The elevator stopped at the mezzanine level, at the top of middle management. It was an interesting sort of set-up, two and a half floors open with the mezzanine balcony they were on now ringing the space, lined with massive windows on this side for light. Across from them on the other side of the balcony were private offices, and under the balcony on the floor below them, Nia thought she could see more. Most of the space below them, though, was simply open, occasionally blocked off by desks and low cubicle walls.

It also seemed to be the place where a lot of the people who’d been stuck in the building by the lockdown had drifted to. They were milling about, or had found chairs or spots on the floor, talking to each other or trying to nap.

János hefted the iron box, readjusting his grip on it, and pointed to a spot below them.

“Found them,” he said. “Zena, the one with the hair. And that’s Gareth and Jonas with her.”

Nia grabbed the balcony railing and leaned over it slightly. No one was paying attention to the mezzanine level, but in a second-

 _“ZENA, GARETH, AND JONAS HONDA-BRYNJARSSON!”_ she roared in her best field command voice. _“YOU HAVE SOME **EXPLAINING** TO DO TO THE WITCHBREAKERS AND THE WILD HUNT!”_

The entire room turned to watch her as she followed János down the stairs. The crowd parted to let them through to the Honda-Brynjarssons.

Nia had planned on having to push through some denial or even genuine confusion on the part of the owners of HabéTech, but she saw the way Gareth’s eyes flicked to the box and how he tried to hide his alarm.

János dropped the box onto the nearest table so he wouldn’t have to hold it any longer, and Nia looked at Gareth and said: “You knew about this.”

People knew better than to try to lie to the Jagdsprinz, but that didn’t mean that there weren’t people who still tried to resist. Gareth just stood there, silently combative, and she’d seen it before.

“And _these?_ ” she demanded, brandishing the handful of papers she’d taken from the archives.

Silence, again; as the employees around them started looking at each other in trepidation and whispering, until-

“They’re historical,” Gareth Honda-Brynjarsson told her. “They deserve to be preserved and they could contain useful information.”

“They’re _witchcraft!_ ” she snapped, the surrounding employees got significantly more agitated. _“Who else knew?”_

Gareth didn’t respond to that, but Jonas, she noticed, flinched; so she rounded on him instead.

“ _You_ know,” Nia told him, stepping into his personal space to get in his face, and loom.

She wasn’t tall enough to loom _over_ him, but that didn’t matter. Her reputation and the mythos around her could do that.

The trick of _acting_ like she was certain of something she wasn’t- Jonas knowing who else knew about the things in the archives- rested on the foundation of that, too. If the Jagdsprinz said she knew something personal about another as fact, people didn’t question it.

“I don’t know who started it,” he said quickly. He was starting to panic a little, trying to protect himself or maybe his family. “I don’t know who found them and kept them they’ve just been there-”

“ _You_ knew and your son knew,” Nia cut him off. _“Who else?”_

“They tell you when you’re old enough to start with the company, I mean _really_ start-”

“So Noah didn’t know.”

“No he wasn’t _old_ enough yet, or Alexandra-”

“So _who knew?_ ”

“I did!” Jonas said. “I did, Mom told me and Tom and Cana when we started and then she told Zena-”

His niece shot him a very dirty look and Nia glared at her until she started to wilt.

“-and Abel when Tom died and we weren’t sure yet who was going to take over from her and Aunt Jean told Gareth when she and Mom made him archivist and I was going to retire so I told Deena-”

“Deliah?” Nia demanded. “Your other child?”

“I never told Lisle he wasn’t as interested in running things and Abel wasn’t _supposed_ to tell Deliah, she wasn’t born into the family she married in-”

“So _all_ of you knew,” Nia said. “At least _three generations_ of your family knew _exactly_ what you were keeping in the archives and you did _nothing!_ ”

“If we told you when we’d found out it wouldn’t have made any difference!” Zena protested hotly. “You would have just come in here _then_ and done-”

“Exactly this!” Nia snapped over her. “ _Exactly this,_ because these should have been _destroyed_ as soon as they were found! _Exactly this,_ except then it wouldn’t have been _you_ in trouble!”

  “No, it wouldn’t have been!” Zena yelled at her. “It would have been my _mother,_ my _grandmother,_ my _aunt-_ and if it had been _them_ who came to you then it would have been _theirs_ before them-”

“ _Your family_ made it a point to only tell adults they deemed responsible enough to handle the company! You were an _adult_ when you were told, Zena Honda-Brynjarsson; and you should have _acted_ like one and followed the law you _knew_ existed!”

“It’s not illegal to own information on witchcraft,” Gareth said stiffly.

“It is when I’ve explicitly ordered it _destroyed,_ ” Nia told them. “And you knew better. You _all_ knew better; but you did wrong anyway.”

“This is why I don’t talk to these people,” János muttered to her- in German, so they wouldn’t know what he said, but that just made them even more aware that he was probably talking about them.

“We never used it,” Gareth continued. “We’re not _witches,_ Jagdsprinz.”

“No, you’re not,” Nia said. “But do you know what I said to the original executive board who weren’t at the workshop raid- Tomoko Honda, Ásdís Geirsdottir, Øystein Brynjarsson, Akane Honda-Brynjarsson- when I went to tell them what Cassiel Navin had done?”

The majority of the current executive board just stared at her, silently.

“ _'I_ _had better not have to come back here’_ ,” the Jagdsprinz told them. “Well- _now,_ I’ve had to come _back._ ”

* * *

The news on campus all morning- and probably on all of Freiezuno if not the entire galaxy- was the Jagdsprinz’s dissolution of HabéTech.

 _‘Effective immediately,’_ ran the official announcement, which all the news media was reprinting and rehashing endlessly. _‘All personal accounts in the name of ‘Honda-Brynjarsson’ will be placed under temporary freeze. Any ship, establishment, or distribution company currently in possession of HabéTech’s formerly-proprietary technology will be allowed to sell them at their prices for their profit. HabéTech’s accounts will be deposit-locked and drawn on for paid leave, severance pay, and benefits packages until all of their former employees have found new employment and then cease to draw retirement funds. HabéTech’s patents will be terminated and all their schematics placed into the public domain. HabéTech’s offices, factories, warehouses, and current stock will be available for nationalization and then public purchase at auction. Production in all HabéTech factories will be frozen but for outstanding contracts and maintenance on space transit vehicles and systems and interplanetary and interstellar communications, to be overseen until permanent measures can be taken for continued functioning by the Wild Hunt or a dully-appointed council acting in its name. HabéTech is hereby dissolved in its entirety in every location unto perpetuity.’_

It worried a lot of people, though not as badly as it could have, because HabéTech was- had been- one of the biggest employers in the entire galaxy. There was probably a list somewhere, and Reno bet that if HabéTech didn’t hold the top spot, then it was only beaten out by the Human Imperial State, the _Großjagdsreich,_ and the Republic of Venice- maybe the International Republican Confederation, but he wasn’t sure anyone had those numbers but them.

So all the employees were still getting paid on time, and hopefully there would soon be new companies in HabéTech’s place, using the same facilities and the same equipment and maybe even run by most of the same people in HabéTech’s old upper-middle-management; but right now there was a still a hole in the world of business and commerce and no one had very good economic forecasts.

As far as Reno could tell, nobody was saying it was going to be a _disaster,_ but they were saying that things were going to be rocky for a little bit until things managed to even themselves out again. HabéTech had never been a publically-traded company, so there was no stock to tank; and with everyone still being paid it wasn’t really like a significant portion of the galaxy had just lost their jobs; and there were certainly a lot of people in the business world who had really resented the not-exactly-monopoly the company had had on most markets because of their age and reputation for quality and weren’t that sorry to see the Honda-Brynjarssons go; but it was still sudden change.

HabéTech’s demise was unwelcome news on the campus of the Imperial College at Kharad less for any of that, though, than because there were a number of people who had been planning on working for HabéTech when they graduated, but now had about no prospects.

Some of them, Reno thought, might be able to talk their way into a high position at the new companies that would inevitably form and most of the rest would follow them to regular starting-level positions once the companies started hiring, but right now there weren’t actually any new companies, so a lot of people were scared.  

More immediately pressing to him was the way Nadri had almost clawed some economics majors for complaining about how Venice was sure to nationalize the HabéTech assets in their own territory and then buy up the majority of the rest of it through their merchant marine to form new smaller, _‘separate’_ companies. It had been obvious to everyone but Nadri that all they’d been doing was complaining, not accusing, and that it had been a way to cope with news but he and Maria had still had to grab her and drag her back; and then one of the economics majors- who had been rightly upset about almost being assaulted!- had insulted Maria and Sebastian by insinuating that their _Elti_ had dissolved HabéTech for the personal gain of Venice and the _Großjagdsreich._

Sebastian and Maria were much better at restraining themselves than Nadri, thankfully. Maria had confined herself to coolly informing the other student in question that it would have been highly illogical to do so because the majority of HabéTech’s holdings had been in Imperial space, and therefore unable to be nationalized by Venice or the _Großjagdsreich_ ; and if anyone thought that the Jagdsprinz didn’t have people who would have told her otherwise than they were _sorely_ mistaken.

The incident with Nadri and the economics majors weighed on him all morning and early afternoon through classes. When his final one got out that day, he went over to where Ravenna was having _her_ last class and lurked outside for fifteen minutes until it let out.

“Missed me?” his fiancée teased when she saw him, and reached out to take his hand.

“Yes,” Reno said, and they started walking away from the class together. He _had,_ even if the last time he’d seen her had been less than a day ago. “But kind of a lot’s happened today, so.”

“Nadri and Maria?”

“You _heard?_ ”

“I know some economics majors,” Ravenna said. “They told me. And some other people talked about it.”

That wasn’t really the sort of news he wanted going around about his family, but he couldn’t do anything about it now.

“I’m worried.”

“About the economy?” Ravenna asked. “The Jagdsprinz did actually talk to people before announcing to dissolve the company, she came by late last night to ask Hadiya about what it would do. There’s a plan.”

“It’s not the Jagdsprinz, it’s what the economy major was saying,” Reno told her. “They’re students, if _they_ were talking about Venice like we’re expected to grab up the majority of the company then _other_ people, like actually established economists, will have thought of the same thing and HabéTech had their headquarters here, a lot of Kharad and a good bit of Freiezuno was caught up in it-”

“And they’re all still getting paid and we have other companies in other industries.”

“But its _Venice_ and _Freiezuno_ ,” he said. “I keep waiting to hear that Augustin Gebar has started talking about galactic trade hegemony again.”

“Reno, we’re _engaged,_ ” Ravenna reminded him. “We did it, and we’re going to get married, and Augustin Gebar can shove it. Yes, people are going to expect Venice to take up a lot of HabéTech’s space assets- but they did a lot of other stuff, too, and Freiezuno wasn’t a ship manufacturing center for them. They got taken down because they were hiding contraband material for centuries, and the only sort-of ulterior motive for wanting HabéTech gone is because they’ve got so much of the market cornered. The only people who are going to complain are the people like Gebar, who have some sort of political axe to grind, and most people will know that.”

She squeezed his hand reassuringly, and he squeezed back.

“You’re worrying again,” she told him. “But it’ll be okay.”

* * *

Damir had not actually left the soon-to-be-former headquarters of HabéTech and gone back to sleep once the Witchbreakers showed up, because his _Tante_ was still there and then Leutnant Harshaisha was asking ROs to stay around and help move paper and he felt sort of obligated to help too, since he was NCO Auxiliary.

It had meant that he was on-site in the archives when Gareth Honda-Brynjarsson, who had the Jagdsprinz shadowing him to make _sure_ that he’d taken out everything that was either by Cassiel Navin or magically sealed in the entire archives, had discovered that there was one file from box drawer missing.

He didn’t know what was in it, he insisted; and _Tante_ had said he was telling the truth, though she didn’t look happy about it and she’d had to leave to get to the treaty talks on Helike immediately afterward.

That had been about four or five in the morning, Kharad time, and so Damir excused himself to Leutnant Harshaisha and dragged himself over to the station. He should have felt tired, but he’d stayed up too long to notice it any longer.

He promised himself he’d take the day off and go to sleep after he had a morning briefing for the rest of the Auxiliary.

It went all right. A couple of them were surprised to hear about the murders and HabéTech, because they weren’t in the habit of looking at the news in the morning, but mostly everyone was just happy to hear that the Witchbreakers had taken over most of it.

“All we technically have to worry about is the missing file,” Damir told them all. “But seeing as the murderer probably took it, and it’s the Witchbreakers’ job to find out who that was; all we’re expected to do is keep an eye out and an ear open for tips or news.”

“What sort of file?” Medeas asked, and Damir passed around his tablet with the pictures he’d taken of the papers lying out on the table at the archives, so they had an idea.

Zannah got it, and froze up. Damir glanced at Hengda, who used his higher authority as Captain to dismiss the meeting.

“Don’t forget Vissa Lauer is still in holding,” he told Medeas and Shakti. “Lean on her a little, but if she doesn’t say anything, let her go. We can pick her up later if we need to.”

“You want us to call Irmari herren Nandrike’s family, too?” Shakti asked.

Damir had just about forgotten that they needed to do that today.

“No, I’ll do it,” he told xer.

 _And **then** I’ll go to sleep, _he promised himself.

“Zannah?” Hengda asked quietly, once the Investigators had left the meeting room. She was still staring down at the tablet, clutched tightly in her hands.

“On the sides of the paper,” she said, and pointed to the doodles. “I know those. Those were things Olivia Haynes was researching. He was drawing demon sigils and bits of summoning rituals in the margins of his notes.”

His husband looked over at him.

“Does Leutnant Harshaisha know about this?”

“I have no idea,” Damir said. “Nobody mentioned it. I guess I’ll call-”

“No,” Hengda said firmly. “ _I’ll_ call them. You go call the family and find out who the paternal lines there are, and then go to _sleep._ ”

Damir left them the meeting room and went out into the empty bullpen to make the call. He waited patiently as it was switched through three or four different connections to get from Freiezuno to Earth, and then into Honalee.

“This is Sergeant Damir Beilschmidt of the Kharad NCO Witchbreaker Auxiliary,” he said when the phone picked up. “I’m trying to reach Sindvern Rägnren?”

“That’s me,” Sindvern said on the other end of the line. “Hello again, Sergeant. Do you have news?”

“I’m sorry, but we don’t have any updates yet,” he told Irmari’s brother. “But I do have a couple of questions-”

“Certainly.”

Damir adjusted his hold on the phone.

“We checked with the Martinach _Polizei_ for any outstanding family feuds Irmari might have been a part of without realizing it,” he said. “But they only checked along the maternal lines because those are the only ones that are listed officially. It would be a big help, to start with, if you could tell me who your father’s family was.”

He waited a second for Sindvern to say something, but the silence stretched.

“Hello?” he asked, wondering if the call had been dropped and he hadn’t noticed.

“Oh, no, I’m here,” Sindvern told him. “I just- I thought you knew. Our father’s alpha sister was Adalbrat Beilschmidt hren Marilaf.”

“Oh,” Damir said. Suddenly, everything seemed like too much, and all we wanted to do was _sleep._

Three _Seelenkind_ family murders in two weeks, all of them in Kharad.

He asked Sindvern for his grandfather’s family and the families his uncles had married into more to be thorough than because he thought he’d find anything, thanked the üldrene for his time, promised to call when there was more information, and hung up.

It was an effort to drag himself over to the case board and put up the information.

When the names were up, Damir paused a long moment in front of the board, thinking; and then decided that he might as well. If it looked too out-there once he’d woken up and the rest of the Auxiliary had gotten a chance to comment on it, they could take it down.

He wrote _‘Irmari herren Nandrike Noah Honda-Brynjarsson Verity Kirkland-Héderváry’_ in a list, circled it, labeled it _‘Seelenkind family murders, connection’_ ; and trudged off to his husband’s office to pass out on one of the night shift cots.

Someone else could deal with this.


	4. Quis ut Deus

It had been a _mistake._

Not the first time, of course. The days of Freiezunan politics being decided with threats, break-ins, beatings, and outright assassinations weren’t all that far behind them, especially to fey memory. Aunt Izabed had cleaned most of it up, but he wasn’t _that_ much younger than her and he still knew where the political assassins who had survived could be found.

The two or three layers of professional middlemen had been cleaned out a long time ago, which made things very dangerous, but Béutros Saab’s father had been Tylwyth and glamour came easy. A disguise, some complaining in one of the bars where the assassins who were still around killed time, and a money drop kept just enough distance between him and whoever had taken the _‘contract’_. He hadn’t ordered anyone killed, or asked anyone to kill anyone else, or even tried to identify any assassins. He’d just complained, _‘lost’_ some money, and…

Irmari herren Nandrike had turned up dead.

That hadn’t been Béutros’s first idea. The first idea had been to misappropriate some FIO documents- fake a security leak. Embarrass them a little, alarm everyone working on the treaty, see what the Hunt did about the _‘threat’_.

But he’d-

He’d misappropriated the right documents but he’d picked up Kgosi-Rotem papers as well and he had no idea why he’d done that, that hadn’t been in the plan; but then one day two days he couldn’t remember how long later soon he was researching _Seelenkind_ families and he didn’t know _why_ and he’d found Irmari herren Nandrike and there was an easy way to get him to Freiezuno and involving an üldrene, one of the Domdruc, in the _‘security leak’_ would certainly attract the Hunt’s- the _Jagdsprinz’s-_ attention, right?

It hadn’t _needed_ to be Irmari herren Nandrike but Béutros had his name and he had just been going to do the leak and _‘hire’_ herren Nandrike for Kgosi-Rotem and when everyone sorted out that no one had _actually_ hired the man it would just add another layer to the security issue and that was fine.

But something was-

Something was _using_ him.

He’d figured out after he’d misappropriated the FIO documents that Augustin Gebar had been trying to manipulate him with all the talk about Venice and his cousin’s marriage- he wasn’t _stupid,_ he just trusted people and it took a while for him to realize when they were taking advantage of that.

He should have stopped there. He should have gone to Aunt Izabed, to Hadiya, to a sündeyalacgh, to the _Hunt-_ he should have gotten _help_ when he’d finished the Kgosi-Rotem hiring papers and looked back on what he’d been doing and realized that it _wasn’t him._

Maybe he was cracking apart, psychologically. Maybe he had some sort of undiagnosed problem. He wasn’t going to say it wasn’t possible.

But it _felt_ like something was using him. Something was moving him around day-by-day like a game bot, dictating his actions and his thoughts sporadically.

He would have put the FIO papers back, under other circumstances. Under _normal_ circumstances. He would have been able to stop and breathe and put them back because he knew better than to follow through on sabotaging his own government.

Béutros had resisted _days_ before going to the assassins’ bar. He’d sat down and searched and searched his magic and the house where he lived with Izabed and Constantin and Ravenna but he couldn’t _find_ anything, no curses or compulsions or poppet-spells. He’d cleansed and warded the entire house, making excuses about strengthening the magical security. He’d burned his personal protections to ash and smoke and built them up again stronger.

But that _weight_ that soul-crushing immovable unstoppable _thing_ hanging over him, on him, kept his mouth shut and himself locked up in the house and had shoved him out to the assassins’ bar and then Irmari herren Nandrike had turned up dead and a small jar labeled _‘IhN’_ had turned up in his room and he didn’t know how but he’d opened it and it had been _blood._

 _Why_ would the assassin do that; he hadn’t been in control but he _knew_ what he’d said and he hadn’t said anything about _that-_

Maybe they’d assumed, because herren Nandrike was üldrene; but then how had the jar gotten into his room?

It was the _Thing._

He was hesitant to call it God, or a god. It was impersonal enough to be the universe but the universe didn’t work like that.

The _Thing_ had made the assassin gather blood.

Béutros had thought that would be the end of it. Marschall Braginski and Mäelle Beilschmidt and Emma Miccichelo had shown up on the express orders of the Jagdsprinz to talk to Helen Ahne about what looked like FIO’s incompetence. The Hunt was listening. The Jagdsprinz was paying attention; and so the little bit of doubt that he hadn’t been able to shake from Augustin Gebar was proven very very wrong.

But the _Thing_ hadn’t been done with him he’d taken copies of Zannah Brahe’s court records and at first he’d thought it was because _he_ was worried but _he_ wasn’t it was the _Thing_ thinking for him because then the doubts came back and he was having completely illogical and paranoid thoughts and then he was planning how to break into _HabéTech._

There was no _reason_ to do that but he’d been doing it and he couldn’t stop and it had been _easy_ people didn’t put up protections against _Distawydwr_ nobody thought of them any longer and he wasn’t _Distawydwr_ not really but he’d used their defining tactic and he’d gotten into the archives and there was no good reason for him to be here or why but he’d brought a bag and a knife and he’d forced one of the locked archive drawers and looked around and-

He’d given up, just a little. The _Thing_ was controlling him and he couldn’t stop it so he just retreated further into his head and tried not to think about it but then Noah Honda-Brynjarsson and Verity Walker-Kirkland had walked in and seen someone invisible going through the archives and-

It hadn’t been _him._

It had been a _mistake;_ them walking in.

And now he had the file he’d- the _Thing_ had stolen from the HabéTech archives and the information from Zannah Brahe’s file and three little jars of blood.

The _Thing_ was pleased; or at least that was the only way Béutros could stand to think of it. The _Thing_ was too impersonal, uncaring, to actually have emotions, or intelligence. It was just a force, _there._

 _Making him_ do these things.

He _wasn’t_ a bad person he wasn’t _this_ person-

The best he could do was try to minimize the damage.

* * *

Amphitrite had declined to come along to Martigny for the Michaelmas service, and Feliciano was trying to take it as a sign of confidence.

His wife’s relationship with Nia had had a very odd trajectory. For the first fifty years or so, while Zell and Heinrich had still been alive, she’d tried to be family and shut out. For the next fifty or a hundred years, Nia had ignored her except for business.

After that, it had gotten more complicated, because they’d slowly gotten to know each other better. Feliciano wouldn’t go so far as to say they’d become _friends;_ but they’d passed the level of basic acquaintance by the simple fact that Venice had become an international and then galactic power, which meant Nia had had to deal with the Venetian government, and so it defaulted to Amphitrite since the two of them still hadn’t been speaking. In addition to that, Polí Thálassas was one of the few Honalenier Kingdoms to consistently send citizens out to space or Earth and one of the most prolific ancestries for fey and fey-blooded sorcerers, so it was really like they were dealing with each other twice over.

And then Nia had sincerely apologized. It hadn’t been for the best reason but she’d done it, and then Amphitrite had been a good go-between, or social buffer. She was included in just about every interaction that took longer than maybe ten or fifteen minutes, even if she was quietly over in the corner reading or doing something else. Her presence kept them _‘in public’_ , and had been very useful in the first couple decades as Nia worked through most of her ingrained anger and hostility that was still, sometimes, her first and strongest reaction to him; and he’d slowly remembered what it was like to not be on guard all the time around her.

 Those things, at least, they’d known they’d have to do and had made a commitment to.

But neither of them had realized that they’d have to relearn each other.

Their relationship- it wasn’t the same, and it wasn’t just because they’d been estranged for so long. When they’d last parted, he’d been her father and Italy and she’d been an adult but still human and his child.

Now Feliciano was _Razanás Venexia,_ the Second Republic of Venice as Nation and as Head of State and unofficially holding the most power and influence and the last say in everything, with no one above him. He had a wife and not a husband, and children- Nation and not- who weren’t her siblings.

Nia was Jagdsprinz, and Emperor of the _Großjagdsreich,_ and the last word on law _everywhere,_ and had built her empire from the ground up out of almost nothing, and had been to war and killed, and was almost seven hundred years old, with no expected limit to how long she could live. She had a wife; and children- Nation and not- who didn’t know him as their _Nonno._

They’d both gotten their own, separate families; and they were something more like equals. He was older, but she was very technically in charge of him as Jagdsprinz, and she-

She’d killed him.

Feliciano wasn’t about to hold it against her- he’d been killed plenty of times, and he’d never exactly been _upset_ about it. Hurt, yes, a little- but more grieving what it meant they’d lost, that things could have gotten to that point.

But Nia wouldn’t kill him again, not unless she had to. If she had to, she’d take him off somewhere private where he could keep his dignity and his children- his _other_ children- wouldn’t have to see.

So Amphitrite not being here was progress, probably, hopefully; at least as much as it was her not being Catholic. It was a sign that she trusted the two of them to be alone together.

Well- Odette would be there. And Nico and Diana, at least for the service.

But there was always time afterwards.

* * *

“You don’t have to come if you don’t want to,” Nia tried to assure her again. This was a conversation they had most holidays, and Odette was used to it by now.

“It’s one thing to not to go Christmas and Easter services as not a Catholic,” she told her spouse. “And as not a Christian. But Michaelmas is different. Michaelmas is about the _Großjagdsreich_ and the Hunt. It’s _civic._ ”

“No,” Nia grumbled. “It’s a _feast day._ ”

“Of the patron saint of the Hunt and one of the patrons of the foremost cathedral in the empire,” Odette said. “So as Empress of the _Großjagdsreich_ , wife of Jagdsprinz Teufelmörder, and granddaughter of Jagdsprinz Erlkönig- I have to go.”

“It’s still a feast day,” her spouse insisted, sounding a little put out. “Of St. Michael and all the angels.”

“Which is, of course,” Odette told her. “Why you’re going in full dress uniform.”

Nia huffed and grumbled wordlessly the way she had when she was making a show of being annoyed, and Odette just smiled at her. Much as Nia was constantly caught between her ingrained republicanism and the reality of her imperial power; she often got tangled up in her insistence that her religion was a separate thing from her state and the fact that she was particularly _Catholic_ figure. You didn’t get to kill a demon and not have religion follow you around into every other part of your life.

For Nia’s peace of mind, at least, full Hunt dress uniform wasn’t _Court_ dress, for her. Likewise, since this was a civic occasion without being a _state_ occasion, Odette had a modified version of her own Court dress. This dress was pure white, with some midnight-blue accents for color, under a light, black dress jacket. There was gold at her throat and in her ears, and overall she thought she’d managed the appropriate level of formal conservatism for a church service.

They walked down to St. Michaelmarc’s, not down the formal avenue from the Jagdshall but through Barrackstown to go down Officer’s Row, to be a little less conspicuous. The Jäger still saluted or bowed as they preferred, when they walked by, but it wasn’t as distracting as the avenue would have been.

Odette had thought that they might meet Nico and Diana going to service on the way down, but when they got to the Cathedral the other two had already arrived, and had taken seats up in the second-to-front pews in their normal place.

Nico stood up to greet them as they came down the center aisle to take their own seats- a bit slowly, because they were occasionally held up by having to say hello to other Jäger or passing a moment in conversation with an attending government official.

“Be nice,” Odette heard Nico tell her spouse quietly when they hugged _‘hello’_.

“I wouldn’t have invited her if I wasn’t going to be _nice!_ ” Nia told him back.

Venice had already arrived, and was sitting by the aisle in the same pew Nico and Diana had taken. There was some shuffling to get everyone arranged, and Odette made certain that Nia was sitting between her and her mother.

As usual, when the service started, she had to follow along in the provided program. Nia didn’t, and Venice didn’t seem to need to either; but the two of them went to services weekly. They knew very well how this worked.

Odette liked the singing parts well enough, and some the pageantry was nice, but the sermon was the difficult part. She tried not to tune it out, but it was hard to focus on it when it was built around a faith she didn’t share.

“The name Michael,” the priest began with. “Asks a question in the Hebrew. In the Latin, it is phrased as _‘Quis ut Deus?’_ \- _‘Who is like God?’_ ”

He paused, to provide a moment for absorption of the material, and Odette tried to think of the sermon as a piece of rhetoric and not a commentary on faith.

“This is sometimes incorrectly put as a statement- incorrectly, because the answer to this question is of course that _no one_ is like God. We may know of people who have been extraordinarily favored by God, both from the scriptures and from our own lives; but no matter what level of power we may attain in this life-”

That was clearly supposed to be directed at Nia, and this was part of the reason Odette usually had nothing to do with Christianity. She knew it was important to Nia, and she wasn’t about to say that they didn’t have _something_ right, given the demon Mephistopheles- but she also knew that she was too Honalenier to ever be able to accept it whole-heartedly. She could agree with the central morals and she was happy that Nia could somehow find some spiritual fulfillment and comfort in being told that she didn’t hold absolute power, that she was accountable to some higher power, that there was forgiveness in this world and that confessing her sins and providing atonement would bring it, but-

That last part, about forgiveness and atonement, Odette could square with herself. It was a rather Honalenier way of thinking, and she generally approved.

But the problem was that Nia was _Jagdsprinz._ She _was_ supposed to have absolute power, at least in some areas; and while she was beholden to someone above her it wasn’t the Christian God, it was Ereshkigal who made Kings, and even then it was more in theory than in practice, because Ereshkigal Queen of Irkalla had never, as far as she knew, tried to press her authority.

When she looked over at Nia, though, her spouse was intent on the sermon and obviously taking it quite seriously; so Odette shifted her hand over to grasp Nia’s, and felt her spouse squeeze back, briefly.

Nia was happy, so Odette sat quietly and waited for the service to end.

* * *

Kharad had gotten _dangerous_ and Emma knew she shouldn’t be happy about that because it meant that the children could end up in trouble, not to mention all the other hundreds of thousands of people in the city-

But she was absolutely _thrilled._

There was intrigue! Security breaches! Mysterious murders! Theft! _Witchcraft_ to hunt down and destroy!

This was exactly the sort of thing she had joined the Hunt to do, and exactly the sort of situation she had stayed in Intelligence Special Operations to fix. She felt _good_ again, energized, even though she wasn’t directly involved in the situation with FIO or the one with HabéTech. Babysitting had turned into actual guard duty, however temporarily, and she was _ready._

Rosario and Domdruc were, sadly, less enthusiastic about this; but they’d been working together for most of the last three hundred or so years, and they knew each other pretty well. Rosario just shook his head every so often when she was looking, and Domdruc made little comments, but they’d been doing that for the last three days since the killings at HabéTech and the archives scandal and she wasn’t about to be dissuaded _now._

The doorbell on the small house the campus had provided for housing the children, given that they came with a security detail and special measures, rang in the early afternoon. The heightened security meant that both the house wards and the tech field picked up the new presence, and presented it on one of the display pads keyed to the system.

Emma wasn’t on door duty, since she lacked any of the magical sense that was needed to handle the wards, but she could look at one of the pads and see that the tech sensor had picked up Ravenna’s digital signature on her mobile devices, and that the camera was saying the other person with her was Béutros Saab.

“Who is it?” she called down the hallway to Domdruc. He was on door duty at the moment.

“Ravenna and Béutros Saab!” he called back, and she put down the pad, confident that Domdruc had read the wards correctly and that the identities of their guests had been properly confirmed.

By the time she’d gotten to the door, Domdruc had opened it for the two of them and Rosario had come to listen in.

“Deputy Governor Saab wants to know if we’d keep his cousin for a night or two, Leutnantkommandant,” Domdruc told her, formal in front of company. “He feels it might be safer than the Governor’s Residence.”

“You don’t trust your security?” Emma asked Béutros, intrigued.

“Béutros just re-did all the magical security _last week,_ ” Ravenna said. “I’d be _fine._ ”

“They haven’t solved the HabéTech murders,” Béutros protested. “Verity Kirkland-Héderváry is dead! If _he_ could be killed, so could you! If anyone comes for us-”

“It’s not like they won’t think to look for me at my _fiancé’s._ ”

“It was a _Distawydwr,_ ” her older cousin said. “And these three are the first and best of the Hunt’s Drakräder-trained Jäger. Kommandant Filfaraskind _is_ actually Drakräder. If anyone comes for you, you’ll be safer here with people who know the signs.”

Domdruc looked over at her.

“Leutnantkommandant?”

“Maybe nothing will happen, Ravenna,” Emma said. “But you’re welcome to stay here and I’m sure Reno would like it. Anyway, if something _did_ happen and I’d turned you out, I’d never be able to look your father in the face again.”

“Come one,” Domdruc told Reno’s fiancée. “We can go tell Reno you’re staying for a bit.”

Ravenna huffed a bit, still clearly not thinking that any of this was necessary, but picked up her bag and followed Domdruc into the house.

“I’ve been trying to convince Aunt Izabed and Constantin to leave for a bit, too,” Béutros told them, almost apologetically. “But they won’t _go._ ”

“Don’t work yourself up too much,” Emma said, and clapped him on the shoulder. “The Hunt’s after whoever killed Verity and Noah. We’ll catch them soon.”

“Soon enough?” he asked, sounding very bleak. “What if they kill more people-”

“And draw attention to themselves?” she countered. “Criminals usually aren’t very smart, but most of them aren’t _that_ lacking in sense. You really don’t need to worry this much.”

“I think I’m worrying _exactly_ the right amount.”

“Then why don’t I come over the night?” Emma offered. “If you’re that worried. Constantin’s family, so you and your aunt are family too. Wouldn’t be any problem.”

“You don’t-” Béutros started to say, hurriedly.

“It’ll make you feel better,” Emma cut him off. “Come on, give me a couple minutes, I’ll pack and then I can stay over in the guest room-”

“Emma,” Rosario said. “You can’t go. You’re in charge here- you _have_ to be here.”

She stopped halfway through a step and gave herself a minute to be annoyed about this before sighing.

No, of _course_ she couldn’t go. If _she_ left and something happened- she couldn’t just go off chasing some potential excitement, or a change.

“You’re right,” she admitted reluctantly.

“ _I_ can go, though,” Rosario said.

“You _really_ don’t-”

“I’m only a Kommandant, Deputy Governor,” Rosario told him. “You said already that we’re the best Drakräder and you’re trying to get the Governor and her husband to leave. It won’t hurt to have me around. And family of Emma’s is family of mine, so I’m a little obligated.”

Béutros spent some more time protesting, but after five minutes or so, Emma managed to convince him to take Rosario home with him- _‘just for the night!’_ \- and they left together.

“See you tomorrow morning,” she told Rosario as he walked out.

* * *

The whole idea of a connection between the deaths of Irmari herren Nandrike and Noah Honda-Brynjarsson and Verity Kirkland-Héderváry seemed more implausible now that he’d slept and there was more than a day between them and the second murders, but-

It seemed implausible, but no one had erased it. Damir’s words were still up on the board, and nobody had so much as shifted it over to make more room for other theorizing.

It seemed implausible, but so did the statistics of the whole thing. Three people from _Seelenkind_ families killed in the same city a little less than a week apart, all of them somewhere where they weren’t exactly supposed to be; with a FIO security leak tangled all up in it-

It was just a little too strange to get rid of, and too worrying to really ignore, even if it was at the bottom of the list of things to look into.

* * *

Nia still wasn’t used to being out in public with Venice. They’d not been speaking for so long that this was still a relatively new experience, going out somewhere for lunch and not having everyone worry when they were going to start fighting.

There were still some wary looks, but those came from people who actually _knew_ her, not anyone on the street or the wait staff of the restaurant where she was taking-

She’d gotten used to thinking _‘Venice’_ with vitriol and scorn, and so it felt wrong to think it in a neutral context now, at least when it applied personally to the Nation.

She couldn’t say _‘Babbo’_ or _‘Mamma’_ though, either- not even to herself. They’d lost that relationship a long time ago, and they couldn’t put it back together, and it wouldn’t do either of them any good to pretend.

But she’d grown up with that, and it felt _very_ wrong to say _‘Feliciano’_ \- she was her… parent, and you didn’t address your parents by their first names, even if nasty circumstances meant that you weren’t acting as parent and child any longer and were functionally something like equals.

But _‘Venice’_ out of her mouth carried too much baggage for both of them and besides that it was too distant and formal for… friends?

Maybe, Nia thought, it was kind of like being in-laws. Their children got along really well, so they were trying to be friendly to make them happy.

It was a lot easier to push through the awkward if she remembered that Sebastian and Maria would be upset if she fought with Reno and Nadri’s mother.

“You have nice sermons here,” Venice- Feliciano- ugh, _she,_ said, sounding kind of like it was a question.

“Yeah, Father Braunburg is pretty good at those,” Nia replied. “I like him.”

They had gotten their drinks and were waiting on the food, so there was no good way to pretend to be engaged in something else to avoid conversation. Nia sort of wished that she’d invited Nico and Diana or even just Odette along- but this was supposed to be time for _them,_ away from any sort of social supervision from anyone else, to prove that they could do this.

“Is he always so… direct?” Venice asked. “They don’t do that at San Marco.”

“He doesn’t dislike me, if that’s what you’re asking,” she said. “And he doesn’t disapprove of me. He knows that I like to be reminded that I’m not as powerful as I feel like I have to be, and that that’s a good thing.”

“Oh,” Venice said. “It’s just- that sort of thing sounds like what some people were saying back when you started out, when people when getting used to magic and Honalee, and-”

She didn’t say _‘I was worried about you’_ ; because between anyone else that could have been friendly concern but between _them_ that sounded parental and they did _not_ have that any longer. Nia had lost both of her parents and Venice all of her children by Germany centuries ago and if they tried to be a family like that again, they’d just have all the holes where _Vati,_ and Zell and Heinrich, and even Prussia were meant to be, and that would throw the whole thing off again and there would be yelling and they would have ruined it.

“I know it does,” Nia told her. “But it’s coming from a different place. No one’s attacking me for being un-Catholic, or un-Christian, or presumptive, or any of that.”

The express support of _Zio_ Cris and Pope Honorius had been a very useful political and social tool to help keep the opposition of early days down to a manageable level, even if it had caused tensions in Church and some fissures between Christians in general. Nia knew very well where they’d all been coming from with the clamor about only God being able and allowed to judge souls; but she also knew exactly where her powers lay and what her duty was.

She wasn’t judging religious sins, she was judging magical ones and breaches of social contract, and she was comfortable with that distinction. Once other people had been convinced of the truth of that, things had calmed down considerably; though there were always a couple very devout people scattered around who were uncomfortable with whole situation.

For her part, Nia knew that she wouldn’t have become Jagdsprinz, as bound up as it had been in killing the demon Mephistopheles, if God hadn’t had a hand in it. And she’d done a lot of good as Jagdsprinz since then, a fact she sometimes had to use against detractors who wanted to ascribe Satan a particularly convoluted mentality and penchant for illogical plans that meant she was _really_ his tool- which she took _personal_ offence to. If that didn’t work, her last-ditch argument sometimes did- since killing the demon and being confronted with real proof of evil in the world, both from Mephistopheles and her own power as Jagdsprinz, she’d gotten a lot more religious and tried harder to be a good Catholic, at least so much as she could be while still doing her duty as Jagdsprinz and Emperor of the _Großjagdsreich._

“Well,” Venice said. “That’s good. If it’s what you want.”

“How is it usually at San Marco’s?” Nia asked in turn, because it would mean that she wouldn’t have to carry this conversation for a little bit.

“The current priest is pretty liberal, and reformist,” Venice told her. “He likes talking about finding and recognizing the divine in everything and everyone.”

“He sounds kind of pagan.”

Venice made a little _‘hm’_ of amusement and she smiled slightly.

“I just,” she said, when she noticed Nia looking at her. “Yes, I think he grew up pagan, actually; but I’m just so used to people making comments about how the Church in Martinach is so much more pagan than everywhere else.”

“We are not pagan at _all_ here,” Nia said. “The people who say that are people who’ve never been to church here. And it’s sad that they can’t recognize that the difference between us is that the Church in Martinach has stayed more _traditional_ than the Church everywhere else, except for Rome.”

There were some times when she really noticed just how old she was, and this had just turned into one of them.

“Compared to Rome, though,” Venice told her. “You are pretty pagan.”

Nia shrugged.

“We can’t help a _little_ of it,” she said. “It’s the Honalenier. St. Michaelmarc’s and the other churches, and the other faiths, couldn’t help but take in a little of the way they thought when they first turned up, trying for converts. That’s just what _happens_ when the Church runs into a new culture. It changes a little to try to reach them better.”

“I know it has,” Venice said. “But Martigny is still the only place where you can _gain_ converts by emphasizing the inherent tendency for mortal life to sin.”

“It’s a city of Jäger on the edge of Honalee,” Nia said. “I don’t know what else anyone could have been expecting. But it’s the hope for forgiveness that gets people coming back. God has more mercy than the Hunt.”

* * *

Reno was surprised to see Ravenna, but it was nice to have her over.

As always, part of it was because they were _engaged;_ but today part of it was something else entirely, because Maria was still kind of broken up about her old teacher being killed and none of them really knew how to do anything about grief.

Not that Ravenna did, either. No one she knew had ever died, but it was nice to have someone else around, and a reason for Reno to get away from Maria.

Maybe it was uncharitable and maybe he was right to feel guilty about not staying with her, but he was starting to feel weighed down and anxious about seeing her, dreading the emotional baggage, and it was important to take care of yourself, too.

“None of your parents haven’t been over?” Ravenna asked him, when he confided in her. “ _They_ know about grief.”

“ _Papa_ came the morning after,” Reno told her. “Mostly to fuss because he was worried, but he sat with Maria for a bit. _Mitéra_ hasn’t come but she’s called. The Jagdsprinz is busy on Helike and Empress Odette is handling the _Großjagdsreich_ while she’s gone so they’re both too busy, but I know Empress Odette is really worried because it was a _Distawydwr,_ or somebody trying to copy one. I know Sebastian was thinking about maybe asking his parents if they could come home for a bit since its Michaelmas, but when _Papa_ came he said the Jagdsprinz had invited _him_ so Sebastian decided to let them have some time together. He and Maria are supposed to go see their parents for this weekend, though. I think they’re going to Aostarth. Sorcerer Héderváry and Sorceress Kirkland might be there, too, I don’t know. I’m pretty sure they were invited, anyway.”

“But _you’re_ doing okay?” she asked, leaning into him.

“I’m okay,” he said. “I think. I mean mostly it’s just Maria and it’s awkward and I feel bad because I don’t want to be around her but I know I shouldn’t be hurting myself trying to make other people feel better either and there are people who know a lot more about this who can help her, so-”

He shrugged, and she leaned harder to remind him that she was _right there,_ and that was uncomfortable in this position.

They shifted so they could snuggle better- Ravenna on top of him while he leaned against the pillows on the bed, though it was a little uncomfortable with his skirt instead of being in pants. The options were to push the cloth up, which left his legs bare and sort of cold; or for her to sit on it and trap them.

Ravenna pulled a blanket up over them, and solved the cold legs problem.

“You’re not scared?”

“Not for us, I’m not,” Reno told her. “I mean me and Nadri and Sebastian and Maria. If someone tried to kill us I’m Princess of Póli Thálassas and Nadri can go lion on them and Sebastian probably knows a bunch of ways to get at their soul or magic or something and Maria could just run away, easy. We might- I mean we _might_ actually get killed and I’d _really_ like for that not to happen but Sebastian and Maria are full _Seelenkind_ and Nadri and are technically half but we’ve got a King for our other parent so it’s basically no difference. If we get killed we’ll get back up again. But Emma Miccichelo and Rosario and Kommandant Filfaraskind- they’re Jäger, yeah, but Jäger doesn’t mean you can’t get killed. _Distawydwr_ killed a lot of them and they’d probably have a harder time with these three than most others, but…”

He hugged her tighter.

“If they died and it was protecting us- I know it’s their _job_ and they wouldn’t regret it but _we_ would. _I_ would- I don’t _want_ people to die. I don’t want to get people _killed._ ”

“It wouldn’t be your fault,” Ravenna told him. “ _You_ didn’t kill them. _You_ wouldn’t have gotten them killed.”

“I know, I _know_ ,” he said. “But _still._ ”

* * *

_30 September 2746  
_ _Kharad, Freiezuno  
_ _7:13:00 AM FUST (9:43:00 AM CEST)_

For a couple of seconds, Oberleutnant Vasco Agresta, commanding officer of the Zauber Regiment in the Toxotes section of Further Space, headquartered in Kharad, thought the noise was his alarm.

But it was still about fifteen minutes too early for that when he looked at the time, and after a few seconds he realized that it wasn’t the right sound. His alarm sounded like _bzzzp-bzzzp-bzzzp-bzzzp,_ not this long, steady _zzzZZZMMMmmm…zzzZZZMMMmmm_ sound that was slowly cycling in pitch, up and down.

He had no idea what that sound was, and it took him a little bit of fumbling in the faint pre-dawn bluish-black that was just creeping over the edge of the horizon and the application of sleep-fuzzy cognitive skills to figure out it was coming from his Hunt comm, on its chain lying on the far side of the nightstand.

That kicked him straight out of being sleep-fuzzed, because he knew there were only so many sounds a comm made. When it was on, messages just came without a tone warning and usually as text, unless someone was calling you specifically; in which case it chimed first and waited for you to pick up and listen. When you’d turned it off, it repeated a quick _zp-zp-zp, zp-zp-zp_ for really important messages until you picked it up- otherwise it stayed silent and held your calls. When you turned it in or out of stealth mode, where it wouldn’t pick up any calls at _all_ unless you initiated a link with another device somewhere, it vibrated silently so you knew it had worked.

There was only one other sound they were meant to make. He’d never heard it before because no one had ever needed to use it.

This _zzzZZZMMMmmm… zzzZZZMMMmmm_ had to be the distress alarm.

It had been programmed in during the first years of the cold war with the Republicans, a couple of centuries ago, since the Hunt had been forced to realize by the _Distawydwr_ that they were vulnerable to quick, effective strike teams, now that they were strung out across planets. The distress alarm was meant to be activated to call in the nearest other Jäger, or an actual Hunt, for help.

Not necessarily rescue- this was a last-resort alarm. The likelihood was that you’d be dead or dying by the time it was answered.

Vasco threw himself out of bed and scrambled for his uniform. Just his boots and coat would do in a pinch but he should _look_ his rank in an emergency-

The distress alarm cut off mid-tone, when he was trying to do up his coat, and he was pretty sure it wasn’t supposed to do that.

General Vuković, who’d gone back to commanding the Toxotes sector once the war had sorted itself out, called him immediately.

“I never wanted to hear that alarm,” he said grimly. “And it wasn’t supposed to do that.”

“Who?” Vasco asked, cinching his belt on and grabbing his magic kit. He realized, suddenly, that Edward hadn’t been in bed next to him- Vasco didn’t think he’d gone back to his parents in the night but maybe he had, or he was in the bathroom or the kitchen-

He’d have to explain later there wasn’t _time_ now.

“Kommandant Allard,” General Vuković told him. “Rosario Cost-”

The distress alarm cut across his words, and this time he was awake to check where it was coming from himself- Emma Miccichelo.

It wasn’t something he did very often- he didn’t much need to and it was easier for his father than it was for him because _Papa_ was closer to Nation than he was- but he stepped himself directly to the campus of the Imperial College at Kharad, looked around, realized he wasn’t in the right area, and tried again.

He got closer this time, but he’d wasted precious seconds.

From the outside, it didn’t look like anything had happened to the house, but he readied some spells anyway on the run and got his gun out.

The door was locked, as it should have been, and he was about to put his shoulder to it when Emma yanked it open.

That threw him for a second.

_“Leutnantkommandant Miccichelo-”_

“The _children_ are gone!” she burst out, and Vasco had a moment’s realization that she looked more strained than he’d ever seen her.

 _“Gone?”_ he demanded. “Then-”

“Rosario’s alarm went off and so Domdruc and I went to shut the house down and await further instruction but we went to gather up the children and they were _gone!_ ” she told him. “They were already awake because Maria and Reno like morning classes so they have their first at eight and it’s easier for everyone to just get up, but they haven’t left the house they were just _gone-_ ”

“So did Rosario’s comm _break,_ or something?” Vasco cut her off. “Why did he set off one _before_ you found out the children were missing-”

“ _I_ don’t know, he’s not _here!_ ” Emma said. “He went to stay the night at the Governor’s Residence because Béutros Saab wanted Ravenna to stay here for the night because he was worried about the _Distawydwr_ so Rosario volunteered to go back with him to make him feel better, nothing was supposed to actually _happen-_ ”

“So it’s the _Governor’s Residence?_ ” he said, more thinking out loud than looking for answer. “Godda- we’re wasting _time-!_ ”

He was about to put out a general call over the comms, to correct the information and direct everyone to the Governor’s Residence; but then a _third_ distress alarm went out.

It was from Marschall Braginski.

* * *

_30 September 2746  
_ _Imperial Residence, Helike  
_ _10:43:15 AM HEUST (9:43:15 AM CEST)_

The treaty talks for the day had started about forty-five minutes ago, and Forouzandeh was feeling good about today. They’d had to take a two-day break while the Jagdsprinz dealt with HabéTech, but she’d come back _angry_ and the Republicans had gotten a little cowed.

They hadn’t bent much the first day, but yesterday they’d basically agreed to the latest set of proposals, and so today was actually polishing, not arguing. All the points that had been negotiated into the Reconciliation Treaty were there, so now it was details and making sure there weren’t obvious loopholes or contradictions.

By the end of the day, Forouzandeh thought, they could have enough to announce to the public that the Reconciliation Treaty was going to be reality very, very soon.

But the Jagdsprinz stopped, in the middle of a sentence, and there was a double-echo _zzzZZZMMMmmm…zzzZZZMMMmmm_ from the part of the table the Hunt was occupying.

Everyone looked over at the two of them, the Jagdsprinz and Marschall Braginski. She had tipped her head and was covering an ear with her palm, a look of concentration- listening to Idunn, her AI. Presumably, Ivan’s Ilya was talking to him as well, but he was busy with his comm instead, expression gone cut-off and stone cold in a way she’d not forgotten, but was no longer used to.

She glanced over at Feliciano, trying to gauge her reaction, and their eyes met. Forouzandeh wasn’t about to let herself seem openly worried, at least not very much, but Venice had never stopped being an expressively emotive person. All of her worry and anxiety was out on display.

Forouzandeh looked back to the Jagdsprinz in time to see her expression go from one of concentration to concealed panic. It was all in the eyes, and she’d seen enough people get news that struck them to their core in her millennia to recognize it in the Jagdsprinz.

“Marschall-” the Jagdsprinz snapped to Ivan; and then disappeared.

For a split-second, Forouzandeh thought it was deliberate; but then the reactions around the table had her look back to Venice’s seat only to find _her_ suddenly gone as well and Ivan sucked in a sharp, hissing breath and doubled over the table, fists clenching hard against the wood as he stared at it, blank-eyed.

Forouzandeh had never seen that particular reaction before, but she could recognize a cause easily enough. _Loss_ was the only thing that affected a Nation that deeply; the loss of people from an attack on a population center, or-

The death of a leader was usually good enough, too.

The Jagdsprinz had just been _right there,_ though; and why would she just _disappear_ and die? It wasn’t a Nation’s dissolution at death and that sort of thing wouldn’t apply to the Jagdsprinz, anyway-

She stood, meaning to grab control of the meeting, but Artakshathra spoke up suddenly in her ear.

“Mother!” he told her urgently. “Mother, Don says he’s lost General Beilschmidt!”

Forouzandeh took a deep breath, steeled her stance, and told herself that they _would_ get through this; even running blind and loose in the wind.

* * *

_30 September 2746  
_ _Imperial Intelligence Headquarters, Helike  
_ _10:49:12 AM HEUST (9:49:12 AM CEST)_

Don had given himself an entire six minutes, exponentially more time than he’d needed to put out the calls and process the replies, to make absolutely certain that he couldn’t ping Idunn, Blitzen, Marinetti, Thomas, Asherah, and Hex.

He’d sent out the call in birth order of the AIs, after General Beilschmidt had just disappeared out of Headquarters and totally off any of the networks Don had access to- which was all of them- and then the Jagdsprinz and Venice-

Idunn had been with the Jagdsprinz and Marinetti was Venice’s partner, and he hadn’t expected anyone to be _missing._

They _shouldn’t_ have been missing. It wasn’t supposed to be possible; AIs were always connected to _something_ and unless they were outside of the galaxy in dead space somehow, for some reason, there should always be a network connection, a way to answer a call. He knew down to the moment of time so precise it was meaningless to non-digital lifeforms when Idunn and Marinetti had just been _gone,_ and it coincided perfectly with the disappearance of their humans. There wasn’t _time_ for them to have been-

-thinking this made him feel sick-

- _destroyed._

He’d pinged the other AIs for reassurance more than anything- none of the rest of them should have been _gone._

But the very first pint, his first brother, Blitzen- he hadn’t been able to reach him. He’d sent out a signal and it didn’t ping back, telling him that Blitzen was still on Kharad with János. It kept going, bouncing around networks until it disappeared into the data-packet sea, turning into background noise and static, unable to ground.

Don had thought, for an extremely short time, that maybe it was _him;_ that someone somewhere had finally found a way to compromise an AI- but his next signals had pinged back, most carrying a wordless query of confusion from the AIs on the other end.

But then he hadn’t been able to raise Thomas, in Rome with the Vatican; or Hex, on the horse farm with János; or Asherah in Jerusalem with Israel.

He’d tried to bounce a signal off their registered devices. János’s, Cristoforo’s, Rahel’s, and Árpád’s non-mobile computers had come back, but not the mobile ones they’d conceivably had had on them for receiving and answering messages.

Don had been able to get Michele’s and Terenzia’s devices mobile and not, and the Republican Protectorate of Rome’s and the horse farm’s servers; so it wasn’t a question of place. They just weren’t receiving signal, which-

It was just ludicrous.

He’d gotten a ping back from Freiezuno’s collective area of the network, and from Kharad’s portion in particular, and it took him a couple more seconds to realize something.

The Hunt was making a big digital racket, but there were ominously blank spots in the landscape he’d missed in all that noise.

He wasn’t getting a ping off of Lana Kirkland, or Edward or Joseph. From local-space logs it took him almost twenty seconds to dig up, they had dropped out of the digital landscape at the same time János, the Jagdsprinz, Venice, Gilbert, and the others had.

Worse- Don almost didn’t want to call it worse, because Gilbert and János were _personally_ important to him and losing the Jagdsprinz and Venice was going to throw the galaxy off politically and economically for a week even if they turned up within the next hour- the Governor’s Residence in Kharad was completely dark, silent, blank.

There should have been house servers there, a contained system with a few secured links to the network out of the intranet. There should have been moving points of connection from the staff’s personal connections through their various devices. There should have been data traffic- the whole house should have been a skeleton of connections and information but instead it was a _hole,_ sitting in the middle of space.

Don flicked the relevant information on the missing over to Ilya, and tried to poke at the edges of the hole.

It wasn’t like encountering a firewall, or any sort of coding disruption. It was as though every digital device in the house had been physically destroyed; like the house had no connections to the outside any longer.

Quarantine, maybe, was how he’d put it; except that would mean that there was something too vile and dangerous to let out trapped in that house, and there was nothing he liked to think of that could be _that_ and also coincide- have something to do with, cause or be an effect of the same cause- with these disappearances.

* * *

_30 September 2746  
_ _Jagdshall, Martigny, Großjagdsreich  
_ _9:57:00 AM CEST_

Ivan had had the Court Gallery sealed for the Emergency High Command meeting he’d called. It was entirely too big for the amount of people they had, but there was no smaller room in the Jagdshall that was also big enough for this.

High Command was, in full, the Jagdsprinz, himself, and Lord Hiruz; Diana Agresta as Untermarschall of the Departments; the nine Generals of the Departments; Nico Agresta as General of the Zauber Regiment; the Witchbreaker Generalleutnant, the Generalleutnant of Intelligence Special Operations, and the Generalleutnant of the Hunt; and then five people who’d somehow earned the right to sit in despite their official rank- Arion, the Kascheiyivna sisters and Boreas, as the survivors of the first Hunt; and Emma Miccichelo as chief field operative for Special Operations and the acknowledged real power behind the official head of the sub-Department.

The emergency meeting was too empty.

The glaring absence, the one most keenly felt, was the Jagdsprinz. Nia was just _gone-_

She’d been there one second and Ivan had been able to feel her presence through the citizen-bond, the familiar double-layer of soul, Nia sitting between him and Jagdsprinz Teufelmörder, the power of his Prince quiet and lying in wait for the next time she’d call it up-

And then _gone._

He hadn’t felt anything so immediate and final since Anatoli had died, but he’d been _prepared_ for his son to go, he’d gone to sit with him on his deathbed and spent three days there, just waiting and pre-emptively grieving.

Nia was sudden; and he couldn’t- she _couldn’t_ be dead, she’d _disappeared_ and then-

There was only one thing he’d ever encountered that could cut someone off like that but leave them alive, and he didn’t want to think of it.

He and Lord Hiruz were both here, and jointly acting the Jagdsprinz’s stead. Until Nia was confirmed dead, not just terrifyingly and horrifically _missing-_ until the Jagdsprinz’s power passed to someone else or she reappeared, they had as much of her authority as it was possible to take on.

There would be no Hunt, not while the Jagdsprinz was gone, and that scared him. The Jäger were still here, and able to exercise their powers under the laws of the _Großjagdsreich_ and the agreements with Venice and Humanity Imperial; but their core had been torn out. There could be no Hunt called, not without the Jagdsprinz. Their teeth had been taken and their claws filed down, and that-

The Generals were still mostly here, but the exceptions- the missing- were glaring. The most important of the Departments in a situation like this were Legal and Intelligence and Internal Affairs, but both Mosè and Arik were missing. Stables and Kennels didn’t matter quite so much, but Árpád Héderváry was full _Seelenkind_ in a way that only the Jagdsprinz and Nico could really match and a Witchbreaker and child of Kore Despoina besides, and _they_ were gone, too.

At least- at the _very_ least- they’d been left Nico. Ivan couldn’t find the rhyme or reason in robbing the Hunt of its Prince but leaving the Marschalls or their most important or powerful Generals but the one who held the most official _and_ magical power- but as scare tactics went, it was a decent showing.

He didn’t _like_ that.

From the rest of High Command, the only missing were Luisa, Generalleutnant of the Workshop, and Arion, for God knew what reasons.

“I do not need to tell you who we are missing from our ranks,” Ivan told the assembled officers of the Hunt, opening the meeting. “But we have a list of those who are gone from outside of it, for those of you who have not full caught up.”

The atmosphere in the room was oppressive, grim and heavy. The only alleviation was Emma, which didn’t life the mood at all, only break the monotony- she was radiating guilt and shame, at least to his sense of her as one of _his,_ over the missing children.

“Feliciano Costa, _Razanás Venexia,_ ” he began to list off. “General Gilbert Beilschmidt. Cristoforo Pietri, _Razanás Vaticanae._ Rahel Navin, _Razanás Yisrā’el._ János Héderváry and Lana Kirkland. Edward and Joseph Kirkland-Héderváry. Amphitrite Kataiis. Tirreno and Nadri Costa Kataiis. Sebastian and Maria Beilschmidt ap Odette-”

Ilya broke in quietly, with the latest name, and Ivan added in on to the end.

“-Marlies Beilschmidt von Liechtenstein.”

 _“Marlies?”_ Diana asked. “ _Why_ would anyone-”

She broke herself off, maybe in frustration, maybe succumbing to the futility of asking _‘why’_ in a situation such as this- he couldn’t tell.

“Is her son all right?” Nico asked.

Ivan waited a moment for Ilya to check.

“Ilya tells me that Philipp is still at Wángmŭ’s Court,” he said. “She is having him watched, and is placing protections around him and her daughter.”

He gave everyone a moment to appreciate the good news, such as it was.

“We do not know what, exactly, has happened,” he told the room, fixing each of those present with a look in turn. “We do not know _how,_ and we do not know _why._ ”

“The why does not matter so much,” Lord Hiruz said quietly. “Not in face of the _‘what’._ We are under attack. Our enemy is unknown and unseen."

“Not entirely so unknown, maybe, Marschall Lord Hiruz,” Generalleutnant Demyanev said. “The original alarm from Kommandant Allard came from the Governor’s Residence in Kharad. A Witchbreaker pair went in before I could give the order not to engage, and the backup team who stayed behind says that contact was lost as soon as the door shut behind them.”

Ivan closed his eyes and curled his fingers into his palm, picturing the door-

 “They haven’t come out,” Generalleutnant Demyanev continued. “And we haven’t heard from them since, over the comms or from some other signal from within the Residence.”

“How long ago?” Lord HIruz asked.

“Ten minutes or so.”

 _“Time,”_ Ivan muttered to himself. “Time enough.”

The people closest to him- Lord Hiruz, Nico, Diana, Generalleutnant Demyanev- looked at him curiously, but didn’t ask for clarification.

“It sounds like a plausible location,” General Yurivitch ventured. “It can’t be a coincidence, at least.”

“And just what are we supposed to do to prepare to walk into a place that has likely stolen- and is _holding_ \- our Jagdsprinz?” Zvezda Kascheiyivna demanded of him. “ _And_ the Queen of Póli Thálassas, _and_ the Wanderer, _and_ his child by Kore Despoina, _and_ Sorceress Kirkland? We would be hard-pressed even in good times to muster that sort of power!”

There was a familiar chime of a direct call to an open comm, and Diana went for hers.

“I sent Terenzia to tell Kore Despoina that Árpád- well,” she said. She adjusted a setting on the comm, and replied to the call tone: “You’re on speaker to High Command, Kommandant Agresta.”

“I can’t find Kore Despoina,” Terenzia told them from Orcus. “She’s not in her cottage and she might just be out, but the horses-”

The reason for silence here was clear, at least. If the horses were acting wrong, it was a sign; and Terenzia would be wishing for her spouse to interpret it, but she’d lost him.

“Leave a note and come home, Kommandant,” Diana ordered her. “It’s not worth wasting the time-”

“No,” Ivan interrupted her. “Kommandant Agresta, you will proceed to Tartarus and determine if Cassiel Navin is still bound.”

There was silence in the room and over the line.

“The people who have disappeared,” Ivan told them. “Are those directly involved in his capture and imprisonment; or important to those who were; or his family- all three of his parents are missing, who never said a word against his treatment. It is a cause for bitterness.”

“But _I_ was there, too,” Terenzia said. “Why am I-”

“I do not know,” he told her. “But it is the only connection I can see, and Cassiel Navin is the only person outside of a King or a Nation who I can think of who could have worked magic on this level of power; and the only likely to have engineered such a plot. Notice that the Jagdsprinz, the only person capable of condemning him once more, has been _stolen,_ not killed. If she were to have been killed-”

Please God, _no._ Please- he did not want to be wrong about this.

“-then the power would have passed to another; and a Hunt could be called, and he would face persecution even greater than that before. With the Jagdsprinz captured, he would have something of an advantage.”

“Yes, Marschall Braginski,” Terenzia replied after a few moments, and clicked off the line.

“What about us?” Zorya Kascheiyivna asked.

Ivan looked to Lord Hiruz, to give him a chance to offer an opinion. When nothing was forthcoming, he addressed the group again.

“We will go to Kharad, and the Governor’s Residence,” he told them. “Since it is the best possibility we have. If you hold command in the Regiments, bring a group with you to support the Jäger already in Kharad. We do not know what we may find.”

The meeting started to break up, those from the Regiments going to organize and select Jäger for the trip, those from the Departments going to inform their immediate subordinates that they would be unavailable but for new information and emergencies for some time yet to come-

“Emma,” Ivan said, when she tried to follow Mäelle out of the Court Gallery to Intelligence and Internal Operations.

She stopped, and turned to look at him.

“Yes, Marschall.”

“Your great-grandfather has a black carpet bag, about so big,” he told her, indicating the size with his hands. “Do you know it?”

Emma’s eyes sharpened.

“Yeah, I do,” she said. “And I know what’s in it. I know what it’s for. You really think-”

“I think,” Ivan said. “That if Cassiel Navin is loose, we are best served by expecting the worst. Find it, and bring it to Kharad.”

* * *

_30 September 2746  
_ _Kharad, Freiezuno  
_ _8:17:00 AM FUST (10:47:00 AM CEST)_

No one had exactly _told_ her anything, but no one had needed to. Isolde had collapsed screaming an hour ago, suddenly cut off her _Elti,_ and once she’d managed to actually speak words again a cold nausea had settled in the bottom of Odette’s gut.

She’d heard about her children, easily enough. Diana had been the one to bring her _that_ particular news, and the information about which other Jäger and _Seelenkind_ and Nations and _Kings_ were missing.

No one had told her that the Hunt was about to pack up and move, that they’d found something; but activity had increased markedly around the Jagdshall about fifteen minutes ago, and so she’d informed her secretary that the empire could handle itself as constituent components _alone_ for a while yet, under the guidance of their Nations if need be, spent a few moment deliberating over whether full Court dress was in good taste and image, ultimately decided not, and had Isolde take her off to Kharad.

A call to Hadiya had brought her new transportation, and more information, and ultimately here, to the blocked-off road in front of the Governor’s Residence.

“I wasn’t there last night, I don’t know what _happened,”_ Hadiya had told her, as they came. “But I can’t find Izabed or Constantin or any of the people who should be working in there.”

 The Hunt had blocked off the road, and so of course there was a crowd at either end and the media had sent cameras and people recognized her as she appeared with Hadiya on one side the barriers. The lower-ranked Jäger, who’d been sent out here to make sure that no one tried to jump the barriers or incited the crowd or any number of other things that could go wrong, were not inclined to try to stop her.

Marschall Braginski, however, was another matter entirely.

“My _children_ are gone, Ivan,” she snapped at him. “And my _spouse;_ and _her_ half-siblings, and their _mother,_ and her step-mother, the _Queen_ of _Póli Thálassas._ Two of my best friends are _also_ missing, and presumably all of them are in _there-_ ”

She pointed to the Governor’s Residence.

“-so don’t you _dare_ tell me to go back to Martigny and just _wait!_ ”

“The _Großjagdsreich_ needs running,” he told her. “And you are its Empress. With Nia gone, you are the only one-”

“They have _Nations!”_ she interrupted him. “ _All_ of them! If they need something done, they can pretend to be Genists for the duration and handle it themselves! _My **family** is **missing.**_ ”

Ivan half-glared at her, and she outright glared back, but both of them knew this fight was born from fear that had begot frustration, not true animosity.

“At least,” he said. “Go sit with Ravenna.”

“Ravenna’s here?” she asked.

“Domdruc couldn’t keep her on the campus. She insisted on coming.”

Ravenna was easy to find, now that Odette knew she was here. Domdruc was lurking about in the midst of the Jäger, further away from the Residence but not really on the other side of the road, and everyone was avoiding him and his obvious pent-up, angry agitation.

Odette understood. Rosario had been the first alarm, and the only one to cut off unnaturally. There was every reason to believe that he had, at worst, been killed; and was at best a hostage, and possibly not anticipating a rescue before the worst happened. Domdruc had been working with the man for centuries now, and the sort of duty and loyalty that brought were strong emotions.

Ravenna didn’t look well at all, collapsed over on herself and pale, eyes reddened slightly from where she’d been crying. Someone had found her a box for her used tissues, and a blanket.

Emma was here, too, sitting with her. The Jager looked haggard, and uncharacteristically uncertain and worried- the legend of Emma Miccichelo didn’t leave room for such emotions, and the romanticization and the idealization were based on truth, here. Emma wasn’t often anything but confident and brash, often to the point of total disregard for personal safety.

There was a large black bag at her feet.

“I didn’t know you had a magic kit,” Odette told her.

“I don’t,” Emma said. “It’s _Bisnonno_ ’s.”

Odette took a second look at it, and noticed what _sort_ of bag it was- carpetbags had been old-fashioned even when she had been young, but she’d seen pictures.

And she’d- there was something here. The Vatican didn’t seem the type to have a magic kit.

“I didn’t know he practiced.”

“He doesn’t,” Emma told her. “It’s his exorcism bag.”

Odette stared at her a moment, wanting her to be making a joke- but she wasn’t, of course. This was too serious for jokes.

She looked at the Vatican’s exorcism bag, and then behind herself at the Governor’s Residence; and wondered if it was worth praying to Nia’s god even though she was no sort of Catholic, and Honalenier besides.

* * *

_30 September 2746  
_ _Kharad, Freiezuno  
_ _8:22:00 AM FUST (11:02:00 AM CEST)_

Nico didn’t want to get too close to the Residence. Just outside the low wrought iron gate, the top spikes of which end at the top of his cheekbones- that was close enough.

From here he could feel the- dampening field, he supposed he’d call it. He was so used to the background magic of the universe that it had actually taken a few moments for him to realize what was _wrong_ about the Residence.

Once you got past the gate, there was no more magic. He wasn’t about to go in there unless he _had_ to- it felt uncomfortable enough just not being able to _‘hear’_ anything from beyond the fence. He had no desire to find out what partial sensory deprivation felt like.

Demyanev was walking the perimeter with him, each of them going an opposite direction. The Hunt had cordoned off the entire block and roped the police into helping keep the barriers on, so it was a clear walk the whole way around, at least.

People were watching them, and every so often one of the media representatives would yell a question, but the Jäger on cordon duty were well-trained enough to not respond. Diplomacy and Public Relations would be putting out a statement for the noon news cycle in Martigny in an hour, and some of the questions could get answered then as the story bounced around through the galaxy’s computer networks. Doubtless there would be more questions later, but the media wasn’t _his_ problem.

He and Demyanev passed each other by the back entrance gate and exchanged a look, then went to double-check the other’s inspection to make sure nothing had been missed. They met again at the front, and Nico tucked his hands into his armpits, shoulders hunched up- the dampening field was starting to grate on his nerves very slightly, and he wanted to take a couple of minutes to not be near it.

“I didn’t find any weak points or anything,” he told Demyanev. “No signs of any physical components for a ritual spell nearby, either. I think whoever did this is using a thought-form or a model.”

“Or,” Demyanev said. “They could just be that powerful.”

“I’m not sure _I_ could do something like this,” Nico disagreed. “If I had preparation time, maybe. If I was doing it with- oh, János Héderváry- yeah, together we could probably pull off a strictly-bound area affect without any binding components or limiting agents in the physical or shadow level-”

He paused.

“Actually,” he said. “Are you any good at sensing things on the level of your shadow-spirit? We might want to get a sündeyalacgh out here to take a look and see what they think.”

Demyanev shrugged.

“You’re so tense, General,” he said. “That you’re probably better at feeling it than I am. But it probably wouldn’t hurt to get a sündeyalacgh out here.”

“Do we _have_ any in the Hunt?” Nico asked. “There aren’t any in my sorcerers, but maybe the Regiments-”

“Would the Marschalls know?” Demyanev asked, tipping his head towards them.

Ivan might not know, Nico thought, but Lord Hiruz probably would. Anyway, going over to ask gave him a good reason to take a break from the dampening field around the Residence.

An odd thing happened as he was walking over to them- some people, by their uniforms not the Kharad Police but the NCO Auxiliary, broke through the cordon line and went straight for the Marschalls. As he got closer, he could see who.

“Damir?” he asked as he came up on the group. They’d moved slightly, congregating around Emma and Ravenna and- oh, Odette had come, as well. He understood why she’d want to be here, but he hoped nothing was falling apart in the meantime.

“No one was answering our _calls!_ ” Damir was telling Ivan and Lord Hiruz, sounding deeply frustrated and a little… worried. “We’ve been trying to get a hold of someone for the last _hour!_ We called the _Witchbreakers_ and there was no one there; and then we called the Kharad Post and _they_ said they were _busy;_ and then the regular police got called out _here_ so will you all _take a look at this_ now!”

He shoved a piece of paper at Ivan, who took it delicately.

“ _That_ showed up in our mail system at seven fifteen or so,” Damir said, stabbing a finger at the paper. “Zannah and Hengda were in the last hour of night shift and as soon as they opened _that_ they called _me-_ ”

Ivan had started to read the paper. He must have found something, because his hand tightened on it and the paper crinkled as his expression steeled a little.

“Béutros Saab?” he asked, voice low.

“What?” Nico said.

“He confesses!” Damir exclaimed. “He says it was him! He says _he’s_ the one who had Irmari herren Nandrike killed, and broke into the HabéTech archives and did the murders there-”

 _“Béutros Saab?”_ Odette said in disbelief. “He’s- he wouldn’t do something like _that-_ ”

“He says he was being controlled,” Ivan said. Nico wasn’t entirely sure he was focused on the paper any longer, though his eyes were still pointed in that direction. “He says there is a _‘Thing’_ making him do this.”

“Controlling people like that is _witchcraft,_ ” Damir said. “So we’ve been _trying_ to pass it up, especially since we found out that you were all _here,_ at the Residence! _Something’s_ obviously happened-”

“The Jagdsprinz has disappeared,” Ivan told him.

Damir flinched back.

“She’s what?”

“Lord Hiruz,” Nico said, edging around towards the great stag and leaving Ivan to explain things to Damir. “Do you know if the Hunt has any sündeyalacgh as Jäger? Demyanev and I think that it would be good to get a look at the Residence at the shadow level, to see if we can find out how the area affect has been placed.”

Lord Hiruz thought about it for a moment, ears flicking back and forth.

“I believe that we do not,” he said finally. “Should we have had need of a sündeyalacgh’s services, the Wanderer is a good friend to the Hunt.”

Well, that was unhelpful. János was _definitely_ unavailable.

“Okay then,” he said. “We can let it go. If this is Béutros Saab, I can just go shred his spellwork apart. Could you make sure that everyone else is cleared away? I’m going to have Demyanev assemble some Witchbreakers.”

Emma stood to come with him, but he pointed at her and told her: “No, you stay here. Ravenna and Odette need someone.”

Emma didn’t look particularly happy about being left out of the Witchbreakers, but she sat back down.

Nico went back over to Demyanev, and asked him to go pick out some Witchbreakers from the present Jäger, and then walked up to the fence again.

The feeling was almost worse, now that he’d taken a break- but it would be down, soon.

He positioned himself in front of the gate and raised his hands to _‘touch’_ the edge of the dampening field. He couldn’t really _feel_ the magic in it the way he could with any other spell, but it was definitely still a spell. You couldn’t do something like this without magic, which meant he’d be able to tear it apart, and then the Hunt could go in.

It took him a couple seconds to get a handle on it, simply because the whole thing was so _strange;_ but then he was able to adjust his mental bearings and reach for the edge of the field.

Nico let his inborn talent loose on the field, eating through this portion of it like acid.

For a second, it was working, and everything was fine; but then there was a sharp smell of heat and sulfur and there was _pain,_ searing pain from his left shoulder down to his waist and he tumbled backwards as he felt the familiar signs of approaching death.

His uniform was bloody all down the front and hanging in- tatters? And there was yelling, maybe, from behind him; and he heard a wordless roar of rage and the sound of a shotgun.

He blinked hard, screwing his eyes up for a moment as he tried to focus, and then looked up at the Residence to see what had happened.

Nico had only seen a demon properly once before. There had been the video footage of Nia’s first hunt and Mephistopheles being cast down, and he’d been living and working around the Jagdshall for more than half a millennia now, so he was familiar with the demon’s wings and skull, such as it was; but those didn’t count.

  The raid on Cassiel Navin’s workshop, and the exorcism of the demon his cousin had called up- _that_ counted.

“Belial,” he mumbled, seeing the familiar, humanoid arrangement of too-stretched-out body, the feeble excuse for the head, the two wings in place of Mephistopheles’s six, the fingers, claws, there was no distinction between the sharp points on the end and the rest of the limb-

The demon had his blood. One set of fingers, long and sharp, was a wet red from where it had clawed him.

Belial didn’t smile, didn’t speak, because it possessed no mouth for such things. The message got through, though, easily, in the satisfied curl of bloody fingers.

A blink and he wasn’t collapsed on the road outside of the Governor’s Residence any longer, waiting quietly to die and jerk back to life- he was lying in the grass of the Residence’s lawn, bleeding out, the magic that would have brought him back from death a few meters too far away on the other side of an iron fence.

The demon was looming over him and he was likely to _actually die_ this time, but that wasn’t important because from where he lay he could see Vasco and Terenzia, further towards the house, go from a second of startlement and confusion at what must have been their sudden appearance because he _knew_ that Terenzia had been in Orcus and not in Kharad like her brother and certainly neither of them had just _walked_ in here; and so the demon was threatening his _children._

Damn him if he’d let a demon take his _children._ The background magic he would have otherwise drawn on was sealed away behind the field affect- but he was bleeding out, _dying,_ there was power here for him to take- strong, basic magic.

His instinct, as it had been with his first death, was to lash out with his inborn talent- to rend, to tear, to decay, to destroy. He was dying and he was scared and angry and so this was simple.

It hurt to push himself to his knees, but the more he hurt the more magic he had at his disposal. He locked his eyes on the demon, clenched his teeth- he was _not allowed_ to die, not until his children were safe- and let his power run rampant as he breathed out.

After the first time, he’d never let himself go like this. The smell of burning, decaying flesh came back to him in memory at the same time it hit his nose, and the demon’s screeching scream of indignation- and _pain,_ he hoped, excruciating pain- that cut over the cracking and snapping of bones under too much stress to bear was a welcome last sound as he let conscious thought leave him and he dropped into a pre-death haze, focused only on _staying alive_ as long as possible, and pushing back against the resistance of the demon Belial trying to heal itself against his attack.   

* * *

Lovino Agresta had had very few moments in his life in which he had had absolutely no handle on a situation- no _control_ over a situation, yes, he was very familiar with that and pissed about it- but he knew what was going on and who was involved and why it was going on basically all of the time, because you didn’t get to be an old Nation without keeping tabs on things like that.

But this was not one of those times.

He didn’t even know _where_ he was, only that it wasn’t where he had been a couple seconds ago and now he was outside in the front yard of some place he didn’t recognize and his country was _gone,_ his people were _gone_ and he felt too light and loose and like if he tried to take a step he’d find himself insubstantial, and weightless.

It wasn’t blind panic, but the last time he’d felt like this had been the early 2000s and they’d never figured out why _that_ had happened, why they’d turned human then; but the cause for this was easy.

There was a monster, tall and winged, towering over the grass some meters away; and it was easy enough to connect _‘no people’_ and _‘winged monster’_ and _‘strange place’_ and come up with _‘demon, run’_.

Movement in the corner of his eye made him look and then turn to throw his weight against Antonio as his husband tried to run past him, _towards_ the demon-

Antonio tried to shove him away, but before Lovino could demand to know what in God’s name he thought he was _doing,_ he yelled: _“Nico!”_ and Lovino noticed the way his husband’s eyes were too wide, scared-

He looked back at the demon and took in the full situation, this time.

Someone was firing off a shotgun, somewhere else; but the only important thing was that his youngest son was kneeling in front of the demon and the grass around him was dark and wet with blood and he couldn’t feel his son but he knew what someone _dying_ looked like and-

The demon wasn’t just _going_ for him, which didn’t make sense until another second and he noticed that something was _attacking_ it, some invisible force stripping away layers of skin and making it bleed and the demon was pushing back and trying to get closer to Nico but then had to stop trying to push to heal itself against the onslaught and it took him a few more seconds to understand what was going on because this wasn’t something he’d ever seen, only something he’d heard about-

This was a real, proper sorcerers’ duel- magic out of _Honalee,_ of the nature spirits and the elves and Kore Despoina; not the ritualized formulas humans tried to obtain occult and arcane knowledge out of- and Nico was right in the middle of it.

Lovino wanted to let Antonio go and run over there with him, wanted to grab Nico and drag him out of this situation that he never should have had anything to do with and take him _home,_ make him safe again-

But the demon was right there and if they tried to turn their backs on it it would _get_ them-

There were two other people in the yard with them, a woman and a man, who seemed have realized the same problem; except that they were also on the other side of the demon, closer to the house, and were going to have to run _past_ the demon and expose themselves to even more danger to get away.

He really hoped neither of them was stupid enough to go _into_ the house, because he’d seen this set-up before and if they went _in-_

A cold, roaring wind blasted past them, carrying snow and ice that was completely anathema to the bright clear sky above them and the warmth the wind had chased away; and that was familiar but he couldn’t place it right this second-

There was a great crash from behind them, and Antonio yanked him aside as a someone on a _horse_ raced by, bearing a long metal javelin-like lance, and Lovino couldn’t place the wind but he recognized _this._

This was _Honalee-_ he didn’t know the woman on the horse but he’d seen storm spirits before and the vaguely-Slavic look to the designs on her tack was really the only indication he needed, even if she wasn’t glowing and crackling with lightning the way he’d seen angry storm spirits do before.

Her horse turned as they approached the demon, and Lovino recognized the move right before she rammed the metal lance into the demon’s side and let go, racing back the way she’d come and just avoiding the demon slashing at her.

That was a distraction, and a good one, and Lovino and Antonio let go of each other to run for their son. The pair on the other side of the demon seemed to have the same idea, and while he could certainly appreciate the altruism this was no time for fucking _heroics_ on the part of some humans.

He was just about to put hands on Nico, to grab him and drag him _out_ of here, when the lightning came.

The air split and the thunder was deafening, the electric charge in the air making every bit of hair on him stand up and sending an uncomfortable zapping thrill through his blood as the world lit up. They were too close to this, _way_ too close, and it was combat reflexes that kept him reaching for Nico, grabbing him, trying to pick him up so they could run-

Something else grabbed him and lifted him higher, out his reach and Lovino didn’t _care_ what it was, even if it was the fucking demon he _would_ fight it, bare-handed, for Nico-

But when he turned it was Ivan, Nico slung over his shoulder and the shotgun from before in his other hand; and Lovino remembered that the other Nation had a winter storm spirit at his call and _that_ was why the wind had been familiar, it was that fucking _Siberia_ thing he did.

Ivan yelled something to the other people in the yard, something Lovino didn’t understand and couldn’t place through the ringing in his ears but even through that it didn’t sound Russian; and they ran for the iron gates that had been bashed down and as they ran through Lovino felt a little sick at the familiarity of this all, though the gates _here_ were much smaller than those in Martigny-

He’d expected, once he’d cleared the grounds of this new House, that his country would come back to him but instead he stumbled in the road that was lined with buildings in a style he didn’t recognize and filled with people in a uniform he’d never seen before because some people _did_ come back to him, yes; but not nearly enough for a country and he felt insecurely tied wrong-footed and there were maybe a handful of a hundred South Italians that he could feel and Nico was the strongest of them and fading fast.

Antonio grabbed the back of Ivan’s coat and Lovino scrambled at Nico, clawing his son down from the larger Nation’s shoulder and falling to the ground with him, cradling him-

The blood was everywhere and he was _dying_ and his eyes were burning and there were reaching hands from the other people in the yard who’d run out with them and he shoved them away, snarling wordlessly; his son was _dying_ how _dare_ they try to take him from him-

He felt Antonio press up behind him and he curled up around Nico, pressing his face into his son’s hair, and tried to brace himself-

Nico dropped out of his awareness and he wanted to _scream_ about the unfairness of it all but then he felt a sort of _stutter_ and Nico was _back_ and Lovino pulled back because-

“What the fuck. _What the fuck._ ”

“ _Padre_?” his son said, sounding _surprised_ to see him. “ _Papà_?”

 _“What the fuck!”_ Lovino said again. It was a miracle- fine, yes, thank you God he could live with a miracle that kept him his son but- _“What the fuck!”_

 _“Nico,”_ Antonio half-sobbed, all the tension draining out of him.

“What the _fuck_ did you think you were _doing!_ ”

“It was going to kill my _children, Padre,_ ” his son told him; like there was _anything_ okay with that sentence.

“Since when the _hell_ do you have _children!_ ” he demanded.

Nico looked _stunned; actually stunned-_

“I have two children, _Padre,_ ” he said slowly, like he was worried about Lovino understanding it. “Vasco and Terenzia-”

“You named your son after one of your brothers?” Antonio asked, temporarily caught up in this new level of _what-the-fuck_ that had entered the situation.

“…Yes?” Nico told them, expression moving out of faint surprise and confusion and into outright trepidation. “He was born on the first of February 2053-”

And once more, _what the fuck,_ because-

“It’s 2047!” Lovino told him, not quite up to the level of yelling but close; because there was so much wrong about this situation and the way that Nico was looking at him was making him sickly certain that his answer was the newest contribution to that wrong.

“ _Padre_ ,” his son said. “It’s 2746.”


	5. Shadow of Death

* * *

 

**PART TWO: THE UNQUIET DEAD**

_“No one ever told me that grief felt so much like fear”  
-C. S. Lewis-_

 

* * *

 

There was, as far as Norway knew, only one precedent for this sort of situation; and that terrified him.

He’d taught his son some things about magic and the supernatural. None of the other Nations had done that for their children, or they’d couched it in folklore and mythology and religion.

Eiliv hadn’t seen the wisdom in that. It was a fact of life for him that he knew the King of the Trolls, and kept up something like a working relationship with him, and spoke to the huldrene of the Jägerskov on occasion and more rarely to the Small Ones of the Silent Hills and was, in general, a very magical person. He hadn’t been about to lie to his son about that, especially when Øystein had shown some interest in it when he was young.

He’d used some favors from his friends amongst the trolls and huldrene and fairies to introduce Øystein to the reality of magic, because he’d still been human then and human magic was only sometimes effective and what wasn’t folk magic was ritual steeped in religion, long and clunky and just not his style. _England_ was the one who liked ritual.

So Øystein had grown up with a secret, and when Eiliv had gotten Norway back he’d taught his son some simple things in magic, and Øystein had learned real magic right alongside stage magic and English and gone off to America to find better work in his chosen career.

But here-

England had told him about the House in Martigny, what it had been like. There was no magic in a place like this, at least nothing that you could use safely. Arthur had overdrawn in desperation and blinded himself using magic from the only source he had- himself.

They could not afford to make the same mistake; but if they really _needed_ magic, _he_ was going to be the one taking it out of himself, not his son.

So _why,_ then, could he still feel some faint magic?

The room they’d found themselves in so suddenly looked vaguely like it could be someone’s office- there was a chair, and a desk, and a window and a few pictures on the wall, but he couldn’t find anything like a computer or even books or paper. He would have thought it was an abandoned office, but for the fact that it looked neat and the pictures were obviously _someone’s._

“Can you feel that?” he asked his son.

“Feel what?” Ásdís asked.

Eiliv had no idea how or why they’d ended up in this place, or why his niece was along as well; but he thanked God that at least they’d ended up here _together,_ where he could keep an eye on both of them.

“Magic,” Øystein told her, and Eiliv hadn’t been going to tell her because he knew that his brother hadn’t told his daughter anything about magic outside of the old mythology but she took it like this was a totally normal thing.

Eiliv looked to his son.

“You told her,” he said.

“I told her a while ago, _Far_ ,” Øystein replied. “I know you said not to to just anyone, but she’s _family._ ”

He wasn’t going to press this- Øystein was allowed to share his own secrets, and all the better for him keeping it in the family.  

“Magic where?” Ásdís asked.

Øystein waved vaguely around the room.

“In here, somewhere,” he said. “Faint.”

Eiliv’s sense of magic was more acute than that, honed from long practice, so he went straight for it.

It was in the desk, and at first he thought that meant that there were desk drawers that they’d missed somehow- but no, it was _in_ the desk. He and Øystein pried the top of it off and revealed a mess of wires underneath.

“Do you think it’s one of those integrated desktops?” Ásdís asked, looking at the removed panel curiously.

Nestled in the wires was a metal _something_ that Eiliv didn’t recognize, a sort of crystal ring wrapped around the edge with wire and placed at the end of a thin metal casing. It was easily the biggest component of the wiring system in the desk, and it perturbed him a bit. He’d never heard of such a thing; and to find some sort of magical… focusing device? embedded into technology was-

Øystein was the only person he’d heard of who did anything like that. None of the other Nations had ever said a thing about experimenting with combining magic and technology; and beyond that this was _clearly_ work done to a factory standard, made with machined and replaceable parts.

This didn’t belong. This shouldn’t _exist;_ but yet here it was.

The disk set-up, when they’d properly extracted it, yielded a bit of magic. Eiliv reevaluated it to something like a magical capacitor, a means to gather and store magic, but the more precise taxonomy of the object didn’t make him feel much more secure.

“There are probably more of these,” Øystein said, once he’d finished looking over the capacitor. “If there are more offices.”

Eiliv briefly weighed the upsides of gaining more magic with the downsides of leaving a known space, and came up in favor of _‘more magic’_.

Another thing he’d learned from hearing talk of the House, and had known on a different level from war and experience of what to do in enemy territory, was to _keep moving._

“Stay close to me,” he ordered.

* * *

Kiku had not been expecting the dead bodies. There hadn’t been dead bodies in the House but they were strewn about the hallways here.

It looked like a war zone and that was never something he’d wanted his daughter to see but he hadn’t been expecting this so he’d led her straight into it, into the blood and gore of it all.

Tomoko was taking it stoically and that worried him a little, though he wasn’t going to let her see that, because if she wasn’t going to be emotional now it would probably come up later, possibly at a dangerously inconvenient time.

Right now, they had time for some sort of reaction- panic, vomiting, crying, a little screaming. Kiku knew the rhythms of a demon house, though this wasn’t the same house as before. They’d never figured out the motivation of the Martigny demon but the way it operated was telling, the slow build of dread as at first things were just a bit strange, then you were confronted by a first appearance, then you found out you couldn’t leave; and then blood and death and time and memories and-

And it worried him a bit more that they’d skipped the first steps and gone straight to blood and death, because it made him think maybe he couldn’t rely on the rhythm he knew, which meant they could be in even more pressing mortal danger at any given second. They just wouldn’t know until they had the demon in front of them.

Kiku told his daughter, as calmly and as gently as possible, as they walked, about the Martigny demon and about magic and yes, yes; he knew he hadn’t been forthcoming and he knew he’d been deceiving but there wasn’t really a place in the modern world for magic so why burden their children with knowledge they couldn’t use and couldn’t share?

“It’s really that rare, then?” Tomoko asked, once he’d finished. She was still taking everything without much reaction; and he was starting to hope that, maybe, his daughter just had a much cooler personality than he’d thought.

“It is not a natural ability of humans,” Kiku said. “There are things you can do that may work, in the folk traditions; and if you happen to know what you are doing there _are_ ways to get at real magic, though the cost will likely outweigh the benefits. Magic is a thing of Honalee, and enters this world most often when humans go there and return, or they come here.”

“Of _where?_ ”

“Takama-ga-hara,” he said, giving a name she’d recognize.

Tomoko blanched.

“That’s a real _physical place?_ ” she asked. Of all the things, _this_ brought an emotional reaction? “You can just- _go_ and the _amatsukami-_ ”

“No,” Kiku cut her off. “No, not like that. There are nature spirits there, yes; and there are some very powerful people who could be like gods. But there are no _kami-_ we simply took the name, or they did, or we both came up with the same one. No one knows. Honalee is like that, oddly similar on the surface but not really the same at all.”

“Well,” Tomoko said, rather faintly. “Okay.”

He stopped her, and put a hand on her back, and told her: “Breathe.”

* * *

“Where are we now?” Irene asked, looking around. “Is it usual to step from an outside to an inside?”

“No,” Arthur managed to tell her. He was still reeling from the sudden, sharp shock of moving unexpectedly from the magic-rich atmosphere of Honalee to this _dead_ space, that he knew the feeling of too well. “No, it’s not. I don’t think we’re in Honalee any longer.”

“How can you tell?” Irene asked.

“It doesn’t feel the same,” he said, trying to come up with a way to hedge around the situation. He wasn’t _lying-_ it didn’t feel the same at all, but that wasn’t really the important part.

“I don’t feel anything that different.”

“Am I the sorcerer here or not?”

He hadn’t really meant to snap- this was his _daughter._ It didn’t matter that _she_ didn’t know that, he wanted to make a good impression on her. Arthur took a deep breath and tried to think about this properly.

Nothing had ever felt dead like this but Martigny, with the demon; but he knew what the inside of the House looked like and this wasn’t it. So there was a new place, maybe a _second_ demon-

But to take them out of _Honalee?_ To arrange things so that a step brought them somewhere back on Earth?

Arthur wasn’t sure he could have fought that sort of power even if he’d met the demon in his own heartland, at the height of his power. In Martigny they’d had a semblance of control, and a sort of power with the time-travel bargain-

That had been the demon’s mistake there, because once you gave a Nation a bit of power any of them _would_ use it as a platform to get more, especially if they were desperate and threatened.

Martigny had been right on the tail of World War Two. _‘Desperate’_ and _‘threatened’_ almost didn’t adequately describe the scope of it all.

But this was new, and different, and the only thing he could think of was to go have a look around and see if there was anyone else in this place and if they knew anything he didn’t about this situation.

Hopefully, there was someone else out there.

“We’ve gotten caught in a demon trap,” he told Irene, making up something that sounded like it could be a technical term so that he sounded like he had the situation under control. “These are very, very rare and very, very dangerous; and I don’t know the rules for this one.”

“ _‘Demon trap’_?” Irene asked, sounding perturbed. “Is this a trap _for_ demons, or-”

“Well,” Arthur said. “Do _we_ look like demons?”

“So, demons are actually a thing, then? They’re not just…”

His daughter groped for the word.

“Stories?” he suggested. “No, they’re very real. Infrequent, but nasty and dangerous when they _do_ turn up. We’ll run into whichever one is running this particular trap soon enough.”

“We can’t just- avoid it?”

“Irene,” Arthur said. “While we are _here,_ we’re under the demon’s power. It can do just about _anything_ it wants to us and with us, up to and including time-travel and stealing our memories. We can’t just _avoid_ it. We can’t even really run away from it. We have to go find out what the rules for this trap are, and then we have to figure out how to exploit them to get away.”

“So they’re like the stories, then,” Irene said, looking like she was on firmer ground here. “The fairies were a lot like the stories, so the demons as well? Too fond of puzzles and impossible situations and making deals with hidden wiggle room?”

He wouldn’t have put it like that, because he just didn’t know enough about demons- at least, he didn’t know enough about demons that he _knew_ was true- to draw a conclusion like that, but-

“Broadly,” he allowed.

“Then we’d better go figure out these rules,” Irene told him. “Because we have to go save my daughter. Reynard Fox can’t keep me from her, and I won’t let some _demon_ do that, either.”

* * *

They were clutching each other’s hands tightly for comfort but what Erzsébet _really_ wanted was a sword, or a gun, or _any_ kind of weapon, really.

Neither of them had been in the House. Neither of them had ever faced anything like this, and she never thought she’d have reason to regret that, even a little.

She wanted a weapon and, thankfully, the second or third room they came to once they’d started to follow the one piece of advice they could pull together from the bits of information about the House that Gilbert and Feliciano had been able to stand to share- _‘always go to the safe room’_ \- had a dead body in it.

Erzsébet didn’t know what Roderich had been expecting, but _she_ certainly hadn’t thought they’d run across a bedroom, but here they were.

The corpse was partially propped up by a chair, probably after rising to face whatever threat-

-the demon, she was going to call this what it probably was-

-had torn his torso to shreds and rendered the uniform she could tell he’d been wearing totally unrecognizable.

His gun, though, was easy enough to recognize, so she looted it.

Roderich dropped to his knees next to her while she tried to get the holster to release, and solemnly examined the dead man’s face.

“Do you think he was wearing tags?”

“You can check,” Erzsébet said. “But hand me his knife, will you? I think I’m going to have to take this apart.”

The blade he handed over was a very nice piece- good steel, very sharp, and well-maintained. It was a bit of a fancy piece, especially in the pommel where an unfaceted red stone had been set in gold, but the red leather wrapped around the black wood hilt was well-worn.

She managed to cut the holster away and pulled out the gun.

“Does he have any ammunition on him?” she asked her husband, who hadn’t been able to find any sign of dogtags in the mess of the dead man’s torso and had moved on to checking his boots, in case he’d stashed them down there.

“ _Give_ me a second,” Roderich told her.

Erzsébet took the second to examine the gun. It wasn’t a model she recognized, but she found what must have been the safety and flipped it off. It was a lighter piece than she’d expected from the size, but it was _something._

Anyway, if it didn’t work, she had the knife, too. What good it would do against a demon remained to be seen, but it was _something_ more than they’d had before.

Another look at the knife showed her something she’d missed before.

“Even if he hasn’t got tags,” she said. “We know _something_ about him. Look, this knife’s monogramed; or it’s an abbreviation for something.”

It was, on the gold around the bottom of the hilt where it flared out, in place of a crossguard. An engraved _‘RCA’_ , in simple script, was centered over the fuller.

Roderich, not finding anything in the boots, patted down the man’s pants, checking for pockets. There weren’t any on the length of the legs, but there was one in the regular place, under the long panels of the coat. He reached inside and pulled out an ID wallet.

“Nice,” Erzsébet commented. It was black leather- _real_ leather, not the imitation that she was used to seeing nowadays. “I don’t recognize the seal, though.”

It was a surprisingly simple design- a stylized stag’s head, with no accompanying scrollwork or shield or even lettering.

“I don’t, either,” Roderich said, flipping the wallet open. “But it was on some of his uniform patches, as well.”

Erzsébet’s first thought was _‘mercenary’_ , but this didn’t really line up. From what was left of the uniform, it looked too… it just wasn’t what she thought of when she thought _‘modern military uniform’_. It seemed a bit old-fashioned, without really belonging to a particular century, at least that she could tell.

Her husband was frowning at the inside of the wallet.

“This doesn’t make any sense,” he said, and handed it over so she could look.

The picture was clear enough- it was the dead man. The biographical information, though-

 _Whatever_ language it was written in, it didn’t seem to have lowercase letters. The first line was _‘ΣAME: ROSARΠO KOSTA ALLARƋ’,_ which was almost decipherable. The second line was _‘TZÜMERJEΣTE: MARTVAΣAKT’_ , which made no sense whatsoever because it looked a little Slavic but the _‘Σ’_ was Greek and neither of those languages used umlauts.

In lighter, smaller type beneath that, though, was the same information repeated in something written in what seemed to be the standard Roman alphabet: _‘Nam: Rosario Costa Allard’_ and then _‘Qushendi: Martyanyi’_.

“Rosario Costa Allard,” Erzsébet said. “A monogram, then.”

“An _odd_ -seeming sort of man,” was Roderich’s input.

“He’s dead, be a little nicer,” she chided. “So we don’t know where he’s from or what he was doing here or why he’s dressed like that- but we know his name.”

There wasn’t a whole lot they could do for him, besides a short prayer, and laying him out neatly on the floor.

“Knife or gun?” Erzsébet asked, before they went out into the hallway.

“Gun,” Roderich said, holding a hand out to take it. “I’d much rather see action from a distance, and I know how much you like fighting in close quarters.”

* * *

Giovanna had seen dead people before. She’d gone with her father to local wakes and funeral services, and to some of people who had given their lives to the Church and died in her service, in the Vatican.

But she hadn’t seen murdered people before.

And she’d never seen witchcraft before.

She’d met pagans. She’d met people who said they were witches or psychics or who saw ghosts. She’d met mystics both Catholic and Jewish, and knew people who said they’d had visions of saints or angels.

She had a general sort of idea of what the pagan sort of witchcraft entailed, because she was everything but badly-informed about her faith and that involved interfaith dialogue and it wasn’t like Cassiel hadn’t read extensively in the subject and hadn’t talked about it-

But this was _Deuteronomic_ witchcraft; _Exodistic_ witchcraft; _‘ye shall not suffer a witch to live’_ witchcraft.

This was the summoning circle in blood on the floor and this was the three dead people who Giovanna couldn’t really call _‘bodies’_ or _‘corpses’_ because they’d been torn apart and this was the candles that had still been burning when she’d found herself here that she’d hurriedly blown out hoping it would help.

She was sitting out in the hallway now, back against the wall and curled up on herself, frantically going over every prayer that she could remember.

The sound of footsteps took her by surprise, mostly because they didn’t register in her conscious thought until she felt someone in her physical space, and heard: _“Giovanna?”_

“Cassiel!” she exclaimed, looking up, and lunged for his hand.

Her brother looked totally flabbergasted to see her.

“How-”

“I don’t know!” she told him. “I was in Rome I was going to the archives and then I was _here_ and there are- Cassiel, there’s _witchcraft._ ”

“No there’s not,” he said. “There’s a _demon-_ ”

Her grip on his hand tightened.

_“Demon?”_

Cassiel pulled her up from the floor and grabbed her arm, trying to pull her along.

“I was in there, okay?” he said. “One of the men was summoning a demon and then it killed him and I thought it was going to come after _me_ so I ran away and it was following me but now it’s disappeared, and I ne-”

A strange expression crossed his face, and he did that thing where he _really_ looked at her. Gianna liked it when he did that, because it proved that he _could_ pay attention to things outside his own head.

“We need,” Cassiel told her. “To figure out how to get out of here before it gets back here. Or how to get rid of it. I have some ideas-”

“You _what?_ ”

“Am I the one who’s studied this stuff or not?” he asked. “C’mon, Gianna, you know what sort of books I’ve read.”

Giovanna did know. She’d found him once with a print copy of the _Greater Key of Solomon_ and thought about trying to make sure it got lost the next time they were going through an airport, but that would have been mean. It wasn’t really an orthodox or recommended part of Christianity, but Christian ritual magic was still a part of the history and she’d been happy he seemed really interested in at least _one_ of their parents’ religions, even if it was the strange parts.

“You remember- all of that?” she asked.

“Of _course_ I do,” Cassiel said.

She wasn’t that surprised. She knew that her brother was a very intelligent person, and tended to take in information just as fast as you could provide it.

Realization struck her suddenly- if she couldn’t have _Pater_ or _Ima,_ with their lived experience of religion and ritual and exorcism of spirits, then she was very glad to have her brother, and his learned knowledge.

Her hug caught him wrong-footed, but Giovanna didn’t mind that it took him a few seconds to hug her back. That was just how he was.

* * *

Francis could have wished for better circumstances in which to have his son be forced to spend time with him.

Such as, oh, a war zone. At least then Rémy would only have been in danger of humans with guns and other mundane sort of military threats, and not-

Not _this._

He kept trying to reach for his people for comfort, and then being reminded that he couldn’t _do_ that here.

He wasn’t even sure where _‘here’_ was.

He and Rémy, and Zell- which he could be happy about because his son was going to need support from someone he loved and trusted; but Francis would never be able to look Ludwig or Feliciano in the face again if he let one of their children get killed- had found themselves thrown together in a long hallway lined with windows.

From the view out them, Francis thought that they were on the third floor of a building, but it was hard to tell.

Nothing _looked_ right.

The buildings weren’t in any style he recognized. Francis wasn’t so absorbed in his artistic expertise to think that he knew _every_ way to make a building or school of architecture, but the cityscape, at least what they could see of it, had the look of being built over time, and had a couple of distinct styles that Francis could pick out.

He didn’t know any of them.

Worse, though, was the sky.

Francis had seen a lot of skies, and knew they came in a lot of shades of blue, but this was a very clear and sunny afternoon, and it seemed sort of… washed-out. The gradient from darkest to lightest from the _‘top’_ of the sky to the _‘bottom’_ was consistent from what he was used to, but it was too light all over. It was too white.

And the sun wasn’t the right size. He’d only looked at it briefly, and come away with sunspots in his vision; but the sun _should_ have been about the size of a pencil-top eraser and it wasn’t. It was even smaller than that, and the wrong color. The sun was a yellowy-tinted white, or pure white, depending on the time of day and atmospheric conditions; but this one was a little _blue._

“That’s a lot of people,” Zell remarked.

The children weren’t paying attention to the buildings or the sky. They were looking down into the road, where a mob-like crowd had gathered. There was a police cordon, but this didn’t really reassure him any.

One, he _knew_ this feeling, and that humans wouldn’t be able to do anything about it.

Two, wherever he was, they put their police all in black. He wasn’t about to trust a police force who wore _that_ as their uniform.

“At least someone knows something’s wrong,” Rémy said.

But humans, Francis could handle. A demon- or whatever had decided to imitate one, to drag them in here- he couldn’t do that. Not alone. Even if those police down there _were_ the worst sort of violent neo-fascist murdering scum serving some sort of bloodthirsty authoritarian dictator, he’d rather face them than leave the children to the mercy of a demon.

If he’d known what to do to get out safely, he would have had them doing it already-

But it had taken Italy God-knew how many times to figure it out, and he’d seen them killed, and Francis had no idea if the reset option would still apply-

Or if he’d take it.

He didn’t want to see his son dead but he also knew what the resetting had done to Feliciano, and he wasn’t convinced one, clean break, one death, wouldn’t be kinder for everyone involved than trying again and again and again and failing every time.

But if he got out- when he got out- he’d be facing Feliciano again and if it was just _his_ son-

Well, that would be between him and Rémy. The others would judge him, of course, but it wouldn’t actually be their business.

But if he lost Zell, too, and didn’t try to get her back-

Francis was more worried about Feliciano than Ludwig, actually, in that instance.

Zell inhaled sharply and his attention went back to the window. He grabbed both of them as soon as he saw the great wings and dragged them back, away, down the hallway to find somewhere they could secure more easily- preferably with anyone else who was alive in this place.

“What was _that?_ ” Zell asked, voice shaking. “What was _that?_ That looked like-”

Francis had never seen an angel, but he figured it was easy enough to mistake, with the wings.

At least Rémy couldn’t dislike him any more than he already did, even once he finished explaining about the information they’d not exactly _lied_ about; but hadn’t ever spoken of.

* * *

His first thought had been _‘find Feliciano’_ and not for the safety of his son, and he was going to be carrying the guilt of that for a little while.

Why it should have been him and Heinrich, Ludwig had no idea. He wasn’t going to rule out the possibility that, somewhere else in this place, Nia or Zell or Feliciano or Gilbert were also standing around, lost and confused-

Well, Gilbert and Feliciano wouldn’t be doing that. They would _know_ what sort of situation they’d ended up in; Feliciano especially.

And that was part of why he’d thought of Feliciano first- his spouse had the most experience of demon-infested places of any Nation, even surpassing the Vatican, and _he_ would know what to do.

Ludwig couldn’t remember most of his time in the House in Martigny. He only had the last round, the one Feliciano had perfected and hustled them all out of the House unscathed, only severely alarmed and more than a little scared and shaken, though no one had really wanted to admit to it.

He hadn’t seen any clocks yet, but if he did, he didn’t know if he wanted to try smashing them or not. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

It could also be that they were completely alone, of course, and that he was going to have to be solely responsible for Heinrich’s safety- and he’d do that, he would _absolutely_ do that this was his _son_ and he wasn’t about to fail him if he could at all help it- but he knew his own limits, too, and it would be easier, even with the added potential of losing _more_ people he loved, if Gilbert or Feli were here somewhere too, and could help him.

But right now and right here there was only him and Heinrich, and Ludwig had no idea what to do; especially since the first thing he remembered about this place was the sound of a woman’s scream, cut off too suddenly.

* * *

The year of our Lord 2746 was _not_ something Lovino was prepared to handle or accept, especially when his son started arguing in some language he didn’t know with _Ivan,_ and he took a good look at the people around them and noticed the uniforms everyone was wearing, and-

“You _stole him!_ ” he accused Ivan, cutting on whatever Russia and his son were arguing about. “You-!”

“I have done no such thing,” Ivan said at the same time that Nico looked at him with _exasperation-_ the _nerve-_ and sighed.

“I came of my own free will, _Padre,_ ” he said. “No one _made_ me join. I was even told a bunch of reasons not to when I first showed up.”

“Joined _what?_ ” Lovino demanded, because he could feel a smattering of southern Italians here, maybe five all together including his son, and that meant that this was an _international_ force and the UN wouldn’t put people in black- if the UN even still _existed-_

Nico got a strange expression on his face and Lovino felt _reluctancehesistance-guilt?_ from his son.

“The Wild Hunt,” Nico said.

There was a silent second when Lovino refused to believe it.

But there was the storm spirit with the lightning and the horses and the sorcerers’ battle and he didn’t have much truck with magic, usually, just every so often the folk things his people had mostly forgotten about- but he knew Honalee and he knew the Kings and he knew the feel of magic and it was _strong_ here.

But still-

“No,” he said. “No, no- you’re _human-_ ”

“Sorry, _Padre_ ,” Nico told him, and it took a few seconds for Lovino to work through it because it sounded Greek but-

“No,” Lovino said again, in Thálassian. He hadn’t heard or spoken this in _centuries_ but the mental push of hearing it again was all he needed. “What? You’re _sorry?_ For wha-”

Nico looked to Ivan again and said something, turned away and started walking.

“No!” Antonio exclaimed, and grabbed their son before he could go any further back towards the house.

Nico pushed him off and Ivan pulled him back before he could grab Nico again.

“Let him go!” Ivan snapped. “There are people in that building and if the demon is not kept busy-”

“You’re not using my _son_ as a distraction!”

“It was his idea! He is an adult as _Nations_ figure these things, Spain- let him _do his job._ ”

“His job isn’t to get _killed-_ ” Lovino started to yell, but Nico stopped, still a long ways from the fence around the building they’d escaped from, and sat down in the street.

The power slammed into him down the citizen bond, and if it had been a physical force and not a mental one he would have been bowled over.

That wasn’t supposed to happen.

 _That wasn’t supposed to **happen**_ Nico was _human,_ he couldn’t do magic! Not like the people of Honalee did it, not like the sorcerers-

But the demon reappeared on the edge of the building lot, just behind the fence, and screamed in that way that made no sense because it had no mouth, where and how-

The force that had been attacking it before, holding it off Nico in the yard- Lovino could _feel it_ now, in a way he hadn’t before, and it was _Nico._

Nico had been fighting a demon as he died, bleeding out in the grass, and he’d been holding his ground.

Here, he was- _winning,_ in a fashion, because the demon tried swiping at him but he was out of arm’s reach so long as the demon stayed behind the fence and Lovino didn’t know all that much about sorcery but he bet that if the demon left the property it would break whatever hold it had on the place.

Nico just sat there, calm under the angry determination and worry Lovino could feel powering this magic he was making; and Lovino found himself shaking.

This wasn’t his son.

* * *

Ásdís didn’t know much of anything about magic, except that Øystein and her uncle did it, and usually she was fine with that. She didn’t need magic for acting, or celebrity appearances.

But right now it might be useful to have a little. She was reduced to following her cousin and his father around as they hunted down scraps of magic in the extremely high-end technology that littered these offices like regular old laptops and tablets, watching as they did their work and jumping at little sounds because _demons._

That part still didn’t seem real. She didn’t think her uncle was lying to her, but- _demons._ Those didn’t _really_ exist, and in her startled imaginings whenever she heard something she couldn’t identify, she kept seeing a gang of men with machine guns, not some sort of monster.

So when she opened a hallway door, intending to be _useful_ and hold it open for Øystein and his father- even if it was only a small thing, it was _something_ she could do- she was, perhaps, overly prepared to come face-to-face with someone she didn’t recognize.

She shrieked a little and jumped back, and her uncle shoved past her and there was a moment of confusion before-

“Norway, please!”

Ásdís blinked, and focused, and actually saw the scene. Her uncle had slammed the person she’d nearly run into back into the wall, a forearm against her throat. The woman was on tip-toes, trying to keep herself supported, and a rather short man- the best description she had was _‘Asian’,_ he had to have been another Nation to talk to her uncle like that and she didn’t know any of the Asian Nations on sight to make a better identification- was trying to get between the two of them, to push them apart.

There was a moment where her uncle didn’t move, but then he backed up quickly, hands dropping down to a little away from his sides, palms-out, trying to indicate _‘no threat’_. He said something quietly she didn’t quite catch to the other man, though she heard _‘Kiku’_ at the end of what must have been an apology well enough.

Japan, then- the ethnic origins of names was easy enough, and occasionally useful on movie production crews.  

Ásdís relaxed a touch, watching Japan carefully check over the woman for any serious injuries. With another Nation, one her uncle had said had had experience in the other demon place, they would probably be safer, and that was most of what she cared about now.

She didn’t want to be in here any longer than she had to be. She wanted to go _home._

* * *

Irene had a feeling that maybe she should be more concerned about the idea of demons than she was right now; but she’d lived too many years with a _human-_

No, a _fairy_ sort of demon, and she wasn’t about to let herself get scared off by something the fairies had probably thrown in her path to distract her, or delay her, so they could keep Eglantine for themselves.

But that didn’t mean they shouldn’t be at least a little prepared.

“What works against demons?” she asked Arthur. “I know holy water, but maybe religious symbols? What about fire? Salt?”

 “I really have no idea,” Arthur told her.

He was a _sorcerer-_ he should _know._

“Well, demons are evil,” Irene reasoned. “So we should get some things that protect against evil. There’s probably salt here somewhere.”

“You want to go looking for _salt?_ ”

“These are all offices, right?” she said. “So they’d need a kitchen, even just a kitchenette, _somewhere._ And a kitchen would have salt. Maybe it will just be a shaker and two-thirds empty refill carton, but it will be _something._ If there are matches for emergency candles then that’s fire, or a gas top stove and some improvisation. Cleaning supplies, too, a lot of those are flammable, especially when you mix them together.”

“You’ll kill yourself!” Arthur snapped. “You can’t just go around mixing cleaning supplies, you’ll gas yourself to death!”

“I know not to mix vinegar and bleach or ammonia and bleach or rubbing alcohol and bleach,” Irene said. “In fact, just don’t mix anything with bleach. But if there’s vinegar in the kitchen and hydrogen peroxide in a first aid kit somewhere we could make some acid and throw it at the demon, I guess. Or _something._ And rubbing alcohol is definitely flammable.”

The sorcerer was giving her a shocked look.

“I’ve been living in fear of Reynard Fox for more than a decade,” she told him defensively, crossing her arms. “I know a lot of ways to have an advantage in my house- my _home._ I _refused_ to get caught by him again, so-”

“We’ll find your daughter,” Arthur promised. “And- I suppose salt wouldn’t be a bad idea. We need to scout the building anyhow. If we happen to find a kitchen, all the better.”

* * *

Cassiel kept stopping and ducking into rooms to take things apart and pocket components of them.

Giovanna had thought about asking, after the first couple of times; because those first couple of times she’d thought that maybe he had an idea that _didn’t_ involve questionable Christian ritual magic but a technological solution, instead- which she approved of much more.

She trusted that her brother knew things about technology- he was a very science-focused person, and knew all about modern electronics and mechanics and engineering and other sorts of useful, applicable skills.

But what he kept pulling out of these things in the rooms looked to be variations on the same component, a sort of crystalline ring with metal bits attached to it, and-

They felt strange. Compelling, sort of. He’d filled his pockets and had emptied someone’s purse and was using that to carry things now, and maybe they’d reached some sort of critical mass because she could _feel_ them.

It was like what she imagined being next to a large amount of electricity could be like. She was so close to it that she could reach out and touch it, but it was nothing she recognized and she wasn’t sure she trusted it.

Giovanna didn’t know nearly as much about science as Cassiel did, but she was almost certain that electricity didn’t work like that, no matter her mental metaphors.

“Cassiel,” she said as they left the latest room. He’d almost filled the purse now, too. “What’s all this?”

“Hm?”

She pointed to the purse.

“Oh,” her brother said. “This is magic.”

“No it’s not.”

“Yes it is,” he insisted, and grabbed her wrist, pulling her hand closer. Her skin prickled and her fingers tingled a bit, and a thrill went through her blood, sunshine with needle-tips that made her heart race. “I _know_ you can feel that, Gianna. That’s _magic._ ”

She snatched her hand away and closed it into a fist, trying to will the feelings away.

“You’re not supposed to do that,” she told him, reproachfully.

“It’s not like I can _help_ it,” Cassiel said. “I didn’t make a deal with a demon for it. I’m just _magical,_ and so are you, and there’s nothing wrong with using that; especially when it can save us.”

 _“I,”_ Giovanna said. “Am _not_ magical.”

“Sure you are,” her brother said. “ _I_ am. We’ve both got two Nations for parents, and what are Nations if not magical? You can’t explain how they work with traditional science.”

“It’s God,” Giovanna told him, feeling a bit uneasy.

Cassiel just shrugged, and took them to the staircase at the end of a hall so they could sit on the bottom step. He pulled out the crystalline rings and started to lay them on the floor, around his feet.

“I have designs for things like these,” he told her. “In my notes. But someone must have made them better, because these are more powerful than the designs _I’ve_ thought of so far.”

“Why would anyone look at your notes?” Giovanna asked. “ _Who_ would look at your notes? Who would _care?_ And even if someone did and then they made better ones based off of your ideas they haven’t _yet_ so doesn’t that mean this has to be the future-”

“Future?” Cassiel asked, looking up from the pieces of things on the floor. “Wha-”

He stopped, and seemed to catch up to the line of logic.

“Gianna,” he said. “Haven’t you been paying _attention?_ Does _any_ of the technology here look like something you’ve seen before?”

“I don’t remember seeing any technology,” she said.

“Exactly,” was Cassiel’s answer. “You didn’t recognize it when you saw it.”

She could see the change in his face as her brother bit down on the inside of his cheek. He held his hands out over the crystalline rings he’d unpacked, and Giovanna was forced to agree that they _were_ magic, because yellowy-green light started rising from the rings and gathering around his hands, sinking into him.

* * *

Zell had no idea _what_ France’s plan was, but he’d led them down two flights of stairs to what appeared to be the bottom floor, so they’d moved at least.

She wasn’t sure that it had been worth leaving the windows, where they at least knew what was going on outside, but what did _she_ know about demons?

She was still getting used to that, demons. She’d been religious all her life- not _intensely_ religious, but she’d gone to church regularly and hadn’t any big crises of faith.

But she hadn’t really believed in demons. Zell had always sort of thought of them as excuses people made to themselves to do bad things, or a metaphor somehow, or a superstition left over from a past time.

That wasn’t true, though, apparently; and Zell would have liked time to sit down and process this but apparently that wasn’t allowed, because if they stayed-

She didn’t want to die. Not violently, not like this; and not without her _Vati_ or _Babbo_ or Heinz or Nia. _Vati_ and _Babbo_ would outlive them all and Heinz and Nia were her younger siblings and so they should all be there when she died, in the _normal_ course of things, ready to see her off in her old age.

They shouldn’t be left with, with a body that he been clawed to pieces like the few they’d passed in the hallways, and knowing they hadn’t been there- her parents especially. _Vati_ and _Babbo_ would never forgive themselves for not being there to do something, she knew. They’d never forgive themselves for not doing better as parents and Nations.

It wouldn’t be their fault but they’d live with it and eventually when they died she’d be able to tell them it wasn’t their fault and she forgave them but they shouldn’t have to live with that, _ever._

So they needed to get out, safely.

Zell thought that they were looking for some sort of back door, because they were moving towards the back of the house and France kept checking rooms, but they hadn’t found anything yet when France turned a corner and froze.

 _“Francis,”_ a relieved voice said.

 _“Vati!”_ Zell called, and dashed around the corner.

For a brief moment she saw her father, and Heinrich behind him; and then her father caught her up in a tight hug and she threw her arms around him in return, leaning into him. He kissed her on the hair and cradled the back of her head in a hand and she heard him say _‘thank you’_ to France and knew without looking that he was checking over Rémy to make sure that he was safe as well-

“I can’t protect you,” _Vati_ told her quietly, and it took her a moment to realize that he was talking to her.

“I know,” Zell said. “It’s okay, _Vati._ I know you’ll try.”

* * *

“But there is _very definitely_ a demon, _sir!_ ” Emma said.

“No,” Marschall Braginski told her. “No. _Absolutely_ not.”

“We don’t know what they have in there or what they could come up with!” Emma countered. “We should give them all the help and tools we can!”

“I will _not_ let you go in there and get yourself killed!”

“I’m Jager, Marschall,” she said. “It’s my duty and my _pleasure_ to serve the Jagdsprinz, and the Hunt, and the law and justice and retribution they stand for. I’ve failed in one thing already today so let me repay the debt-”

“This is _not about you,_ ” Marschall Braginski snapped.

“I didn’t say it was,” Emma told him. “But you weren’t listening when the argument was _‘there’s a demon, we have the exorcism kit, let me take it in’_ , so I had to try something different!”

“We will _not_ lose _anyone else._ ”

“We might,” Emma said. “If you don’t let me go. I don’t rely on magic and I’m a Witchbreaker and we _know_ that Cassiel Navin is gone because Terenzia said so so he’s almost certainly in there somewhere _and_ we know that the demon has pulled _Seelenkind_ progenitor Nations out of time once at least, and I’m one of the few human Jäger left _and_ available who knows an old language that would be understood by _all_ of the possible people who fit that description.”

“You will _die-_ ”

“Then I die, sir. I will have died in service to my Prince and to God and I will be welcome in Heaven.”

Marschall Braginski tried to stare her down. It didn’t work.

“You can’t go alone,” he said.

“I’ll take Terenzia.”

“She is emotionally compromised by the loss of her spouse and it would distract General Agresta.”

“Zorya’s faced a demon before,” Emma said. “And I know she and Mosè have a thing but I think that makes her motivated and not compromised.”

“She is on High Command and the Hunt cannot afford to lose more of it than is absolutely necessary.”

“ _I’ll_ go with her,” Domdruc spoke up.

Marschall Braginski frowned at him.

“No.”

“Yes,” Domdruc said. “Emma and I are a team. We’ve been one since the Republican Secession. You’re the one who put us together, Marschall, and you know exactly how well we work. If Rosario is still alive in there, then we can even find him as well, and then it’s the _three_ of us together.”

“You are kodrene-”

“And I’m _Drakräder_ ,” Domdruc said. “And I don’t _have_ to have magic to be capable of serving my Prince and my King. Sir.”

“Please,” Emma added, because it didn’t look like the Marschall was swayed.

A few long moments of him staring at them passed, and then he closed his eyes and sighed.

“You could die as you try to go in,” he said. “You could never even get into the Residence.”

“You don’t try to kill your prey until you’re sure you’ve got them trapped,” Domdruc said.

“I’m pretty sure the hard part with Mephistopheles was the getting out,” Emma added.

“Do you know what the inside is like?” Marschall Braginski asked.

“I have a general idea,” Emma said.

“That is not good enough. Go have Ravenna make you a map.”

They had to track down some paper for that, since they couldn’t count on electronics or anything digital working. Making the map seemed to be a welcome distraction to the girl.

“Please,” she said when she handed it over. “My parents and Reno-”

“We’ll find them,” Emma promised.

Odette fixed her partner with a look.

“I would have a promise from you, Domdruc Filfaraskind, as a member of the people you are named for,” she said quietly.

Domdruc bowed his head.

“What, Your Majesty?”

“Nia,” she said. “My children. _Alive._ At the cost of your soul if you must.”

Domdruc might have agreed to those terms, because he was Honalenier, but Emma wasn’t about to let him.

“We’ll do our best,” she told Odette, before Dom could say anything. “And if we can’t- keep them alive; you’ll have something for the funerals.”

The Empress of the _Großjagdsreich_ ’s eyes went hard and burning.

_“Do not let there be funerals.”_

“Your Majesty,” Domdruc murmured, and Emma pulled him away before he could commit to anything.

Marschall Braginski took them around to the back of the Residence, stepping them out of the crowd of Jäger around the front in hopes that the demon was too distracted by General Agresta’s constant onslaught to notice the details of anyone’s comings and goings.

“I do not know what any of those inside know,” he told them. “So: this is the demon Belial, who has shown a capability to snatch people out of time, and Cassiel Navin is missing.”

“We’ll tell them, Marschall,” Domdruc said, and started checking his equipment a last time, before they went through the back gate.

Emma hadn’t been expecting the Marschall to pull her aside.

“You cannot count on any communications technology functioning,” he warned her, like she didn’t already know. “You will be alone from the moment you enter the Residence until the moment you come out, and Jäger can provide distraction and covering fire-”

“I know,” Emma said. “It’s an operation behind enemy lines; I _know_. Sir- what’s _really_ wrong? Is it Cassiel Navin because I’ve never faced him before but if you think I can’t do it-”

“No,” Marschall Braginski told her. “No, it is not that. I-”

He squeezed her shoulder.

“You have your great-grandfather still, but I-”

She hugged him.

“I know this is dangerous,” Emma said. “And I know you’ve lost people already today but I’m going to be as careful as I can afford to be, and I’m going to do my best to come back out. I don’t want to hurt you if I can help it.”

He surprised her again by hugging her back, actually lifting her up off her feet.

The Marschall put her back down after a few seconds, and she stepped back and saluted. Dom’s check was done, and she’d done hers already- she had her gun, her officer’s knife, a copy of Dom’s long iron _Drakräder_ knife in her boot, her assortment of hidden weapons; _Bisnonno_ ’s exorcism bag, and a magic kit _she_ couldn’t use but was stuffed full of supplies for folk magic that János or Árpád Héderváry or some of the others should be able to make some use of, including a bit of canned power.

“ _Bog i svyatoy Mikhail poyti s vy vse,_ ” Marschall Braginski told them, and Emma didn’t know Russian but she could pick out _‘Michael’_ well enough.

“ _Pax tecum_ ,” Emma wished him back; and she and Domdruc turned to enter the grounds of the Governor’s Residence.

* * *

Roderich and Erzsébet had left the top floor some minutes ago, down what seemed to be a back private staircase. It had come out behind a large desk at the head of an office that wasn’t in a decorative style Roderich recognized, but seemed of good quality all the same.

There were papers in a file on top of the desk, and some more in a drawer when they investigated. Some pieces looked like official stationery, with letterheads. Embossed next to a coat-of-arms were the words _‘Muzduli-goula mna’freiezun’_ in gold, and then under that in smaller letters: _‘Muzauhna Saab Izabed’_.

Roderich muttered them to himself, trying to place the sound combinations. The double-a in _‘Saab’_ was very Arabic, and he could almost see _‘Muzduli-goula’_ ; but at the same time the rest of it didn’t sound right for that at all.

“Georgian?” Erzsébet suggested, looking at the spread out papers from the file on the desk. “Armenian?”

Roderich looked at the header line for the paper he was looking at.

_‘MOUHBIQARA. Dzhutiya: Utiani Driqaa’baorou Bosrah’_

“No, I don’t think so,” he said.

His wife looked over at his paper, and her eyes widened slightly in surprise.

“Well,” she said, pointing to a section. “I know _that_ word.”

 _‘Ibaam Beilschmidt ummasel diymna’Shahanshah’_ , Roderich read, the familiar surname jumping out of the mystery language as too consonantal, not liquid enough, to belong with the rest of the text.

“And this,” he said. “ _‘Shahanshah’_. Persian.”

“But I don’t think this is Farsi,” Erzsébet said. “And why transliterate it? Where on Earth _are_ we?”

“Perhaps it’s a form of code,” Roderich suggested, unconvinced of the idea himself.

“If it’s a code that can be solved easily by someone with a pencil and some paper, it’s a pretty unsecure code,” Erzsébet said. “I don’t know who this _‘Beilschmidt’_ is supposed to be, though. It can’t be Ludwig or Gilbert, because it has something to do with an emperor, and there aren’t any Arabic or Persian emperors any longer.”

“It could be talking about history,” he said. “Or perhaps Ludwig spoke to the Emperor of Japan recently.”

“Then where does it say _‘Japan’_?” Erzsébet asked. “ _I_ don’t see it anywhere, not in Arabic and not in Persian, or anything that looks like it. And why would there be something about old history that’s on what’s probably government stationery?”

“I don’t _know,_ ” Roderich said, exasperated. “I have absolutely no idea. I don’t know what’s going on and I don’t know where we are or why we’re here or what we’re supposed to do about it!”

His wife didn’t reply, only put a hand on his arm comfortingly.

A second later, that turned into a strong grip as they heard the door open. They both whirled around, Erzsebet trying to slip in front of him, even though _he_ was the one with the gun.

Her insistence on protecting him was appreciated, usually, though sometimes the assumption that he couldn’t take care of himself was a bit grating. He’d been an empire, and she _knew_ that. She’d been around for most of it.

And right now he was trying to aim over her shoulder, which wasn’t going to go very well, even if he’d been particularly good with guns in the first place. He wasn’t _bad,_ but he wasn’t very outstanding at any sort of martial behavior. That was Erzsébet’s area of expertise; or Sebastian’s, or Gilbert’s, or Feliks’s.

Thankfully, though, the gun and his wife’s protective instinct weren’t needed. The door opening hadn’t been a few seconds’ warning of a horrible death.

It was only Giovanna; and Cassiel.

* * *

They came across a pile of device components at the foot of the staircase, drained of magic, and Eiliv wondered about who else had had this idea- who else could be in here.

England would do this sort of thing, he was sure, but England had left for Honalee and there was no reason to think that the demon could have reached them there. Maybe one of the other Nations, who had had dealings with magic but had largely left it behind as the humans did, Finland or Romano or Hungary or Poland or one of them, had snatched an opportunity to gain even a hint of an advantage.

Japan said it hadn’t been him, and Eiliv believed it. He’d offered to cut the other Nation in on the magic collection process- it was only polite, and he did owe the man for assaulting his daughter- but Kiku had declined. He’d said this wasn’t his sort of magic.

 The capacitors he’d been draining didn’t seem like _any_ Nation’s sort of magic, but who else could it be? He couldn’t imagine that there was some sort of Earth-based fey conspiracy to pass a magic-technology hybrid off as astounding new tech developments; but what options did that leave?

Had some human somewhere come up with a way to tap into magic with science, and they just didn’t know what they’d found? Was there some sort of machine somewhere that was gathering up magic and charging this capacitors, and maybe it had malfunctioned horrifically and gone into some magical equivalent of a nuclear meltdown and dragged them all here?

Surely there would be some sort smaller device- a little battery? a prototype?- that some scientist types could carry around-

He sounded like a conspiracy theorist, even to himself. He’d heard nothing to suggest that any company anywhere had come up with something like that-

But if they had might they not sit on it, wait for a favorable market or try to understand better what they had first-

 _Stop,_ Eiliv told himself sternly. _Stop. Do not make assumptions. Assumptions will get someone hurt, or killed._

* * *

Arthur hadn’t expected to find anything particularly useful, much less the kitchen that Irene was hoping for.

The wall painted with blood brought him up short. For a few moments, he wasn’t looking at _this_ wall, but a room in the House, with bloody numbers all over the walls.

But this- this was different. He forced himself to take a breath and look at the here-and-now with clear eyes.

After a few moments, he was relieved that he had. He _knew_ this magic, or at least most of it, even if he was surprised at the content. It was a sign that there was _someone_ else in this place who was resisting the demon, and probably had more information than they did- and was mostly likely a magician of some sort, even if it was only in learning and not in actual magic.

The doorframe had been written around with the Seven Names of God in Hebrew, three to either side and then the Tetragrammaton twice, once on the left and once on the right, flanking _Eyeh asher eyeh,_ and then below that on the door the same again in Latin: _Ergo sum qui sum._

_And God said unto Moses: I AM THAT I AM_

What must have been the rest of the blood had been used to make a complex seal he didn’t recognize, with a stylized stag’s head at the center and some long word or short phrase written beneath it in no alphabet he recognized.

The blood on the door was still wet but either whoever had done this had run out or decided to use blood only on the most vulnerable part of the magic they’d set up, because spread out on the wall to either side were passages from scripture in Hebrew, in Latin, in Greek, in Aramaic; seals out of the Greater and Lesser Keys of Solomon and the Kabbala; bits and pieces of heresy down through the years that he’d thought lost in fires or locked away; scratched into the paint or drawn on with graphite or charcoal or marker. 

It even got away from the strictly religious ritual magic that was so comforting to see, edging sideways into runic inscriptions he could transliterate but not understand and abstract geometric symbols of old religions he’d come across in times long past but never used, their meanings forgotten or misattributed now; and things he’d never seen, more lettering like what was below the door seal and some very simple art reminiscent of cave paintings, done in red and yellow ochre carefully smeared on the wall, and in black ink and lapis lazuli blue, patterns in white made by defining spaces of the wall paint with the other colors.

The ochre and the ink and the negative white space in the designs and the simple vibrant lifelike outlines of the Paleolithic-like art gave him pause; and Arthur had to resist the urge to reach out and touch.

Religious magic was expected in a setting like this, and the pagan throwbacks weren’t that surprising. There was a long history, in Christian ritual magic and folk traditions at least, towards subsuming and reapplying pagan forms, and he’d seem them pop up against consistently, unconsciously, throughout the centuries.

But even the modern pagans, the reconstructionists who cared for the lost cultures and rites as much as the gods and the more broadly-focused who were liberal with their religious influences and magickal practices, didn’t go back as far as their Neolithic and Paleolithic ancestors, to the very roots of human faith and religious activity in the Stone Age and Ice Age.

And the color scheme, red and yellow and blue and black and white- the first thing that came to mind for him was the scraps the fairies had told him about magic in Honalee, but that wouldn’t be found with Christian and Jewish imagery, or even the pagan ones. They were two different traditions, two different worlds.

The mystery of some of this magic wasn’t as important as what he could identify, though; the religious ritual magic and, when he looked down, the salt across the threshold, gone red in some places from where it had been lain down over spilled drops of blood.

Irene grabbed him when he went to knock on the wall, trying to hold him back.

“It’s nothing to be scared of,” Arthur told her, and realized that while _he_ knew religious ritual magic when he saw it, she probably didn’t. He waved his free hand at the wall and the door. “It looks religious for a good reason. Someone is trying to keep the demon away.”

“It’s not… Satanists?” Irene asked suspiciously.

“I promise you, it’s not.”

She let him go, and he pounded on a clear section of wall.

“In the name of God and Jesus and the Blessed Virgin Mary; will you let us _in!_ ”

* * *

Just as they’d thought, Emma and Domdruc got into the Governor’s Residence just fine. General Agresta was keeping the demon too occupied out front, defending itself and the territory and the people it had claimed, to spend any time bothering with them.

Ravenna’s map had them going in the back employees’ entrance. Sure enough, their comms went dead as soon as the door shut behind them.

They exchanged a look and glanced around the room they were in. It was a small lobby with a security checkpoint at the far end, the guard’s stall boxed in with bulletproof and anti-plasma imitation glass. There was only one way further into the Residence, which was past the checkpoint.

“Do you think that with the way communications won’t come in or out,” Domdruc said. “That maybe the security alarms aren’t working either?”

“I don’t think we can count on that,” Emma said. “The lights are still on so the Residence is still drawing power. Security systems for important government buildings are internal circuits, and usually don’t have wireless signals as part of any of the important components.”

Domdruc peered through the glass on the guard’s stall.

“Nothing,” he said. “No one was on duty, or they left to try to secure the building or other employees when the demon appeared.”

“And the door’s locked, isn’t it.”

He tried to door just in case, not because either of them expected it to be unlocked. It was a closed door with an electronic lock on a security checkpoint- it would have locked automatically.

Emma checked the map Ravenna had drawn to see where the security hub was located. It was in the sub-basement, with the entrance in the elevators past the security checkpoint, in the wider lobby beyond.

“We might be able to force the stall,” Domdruc said, pointing to the security window. It was on an up-and-down sliding mechanism, for quick release in case someone tried to force the checkpoint or jump the gate, so the guard could drop the front panel into the desk part of the stall and lunge forward to grab anyone trying for unauthorized entry.

“We don’t know what that might set off,” Emma said. “And there might not be controls in the box to shut anything down once it’s been set off. Or they’ll need a password and a security key and biometrics.”

“And we don’t have time to fool them,” Domdruc reluctantly agreed. His tail started twitching in agitation, and he began pacing.

Emma stared at the security checkpoint for a couple of minutes, trying to come up with some way to get past the alarms.

“What if we went around?” Domdruc asked suddenly.

“Do we _want_ to risk going back outside?” she asked.

“No,” he said. “That’s not what I meant.”

Emma looked over at him. He was standing close to one of the interior walls that separated the small lobby from the large one beyond the checkpoint, looking at it. As she watched, he slipped one of his pair of iron knuckledusters onto his hand, and then slammed it into the wall.

“Sheetrock,” he said, grabbing a handful of the crumbling building material. “Easy.”

Emma came over to join him and Domdruc left off his knuckledusters in favor of both of them using knives and hands to enlarge the hole, so they could see what things looked like inside the wall. Whoever had built this building had done it up to code, thankfully, so the wires were all strung about a foot and a half off the ground horizontally across the inside of the walls, or bundled together in cords up the beams of the wooden framing.

After they’d gotten the look inside the walls, Emma starting applying her foot to it, kicking in loose pieces of the sheetrock and littering the floor with fine white dust and chalky clumps. It was messy business, but eventually they managed to clear out a section between two beams enough to step over the wires and slip into the larger lobby.

Emma eyed the hole in the wall suspiciously for a few seconds after they’d come out the other side.

“The Residence has only been demon-infested for a couple of hours,” Domdruc said. “I don’t think it’s going to start fixing itself yet.”

“Still,” Emma said, but turned away to investigate the lobby. There were two elevators and a second security point, this one simply a desk for distributing visitor’s passes and keeping track of through traffic.

They found the corpses of the desk staffer and the security guard from the checkpoint stall behind the desk. They took the guard’s gun and lifted their security passes, just in case they could be used later. Domdruc made a quick look through the desk drawers and came up with a physical key ring, full of actual keys. They took that too.

“If you’re a sorcerer or a King of Honalee,” Emma said, spreading the sheets of the map out on the desk to take a look at all of them. “And you found yourself trapped somewhere where there wasn’t any magic, where would you go to get the advantage?”

“Do they have an in-house workshop?” Domdruc asked.

Emma checked the likely places- by the bedrooms, in the basement, in the far corners of the building- and didn’t see one.

“I’d go to the security hub,” she said.

“You don’t have any magic.”

“But you could see all the security feeds from there,” Emma argued. “And know exactly what was going on. It’s a strategic advantage.”

“Well,” Domdruc said. “Are you going to completely drop magic and try the mundane strategic advantage, or are you going to try to regain some magic?”

Emma thought about what Marschall Braginski would do.

“Try for both?” she suggested. “So not an office, and not the bedrooms.”

The sheets for the top two floors of the building were folded up and put back in her pocket.

“The reception rooms likely aren’t defensible,” Domdruc said. “Same for the Secretariat bullpen offices.”

That was more than half of the first floor ruled out then.

“So the basement and the sub-basement,” Emma said. “And the behind-door service areas like the archives and the storage rooms and the kitche-”

She had no idea how she’d missed someone coming up behind her- probably it was because she and Domdruc were on the lookout for the demon coming back, and not a more mundane physical attack, and certainly not in this location.

But an arm came down around her shoulders and she dropped slightly, down and to the back, to get a leg between her attacker’s and throw off their center of gravity so she could knock them to the ground; but the other person had been expecting that and guided her through her intended trajectory to throw _her_ to the ground instead, face-first.

Emma rolled herself over on her back, bringing her legs up so she could kick if her attacker came that way and arms up in front of her face in a defensive boxing position, ready to protect against blows to her head or neck and also jab back. Domdruc snarled somewhere as she turned over and she lashed out with her feet, connecting with something wide and alternately hard and soft- stomach or pelvis, she thought.

“Jäger!” she yelled. “We’re _Jäger,_ you idiot!”

She heard a soft _thump_ under her yelling and continued her roll to get back to her feet, drawing the long _Drakräder_ knife from her boot. It was as good a weapon for blocking attacks as it was for stabbing or slashing, and people were often intimidated by the length of it. Even a few seconds of hesitation could give her an opening to take the advantage.

Dom was down on top of the man who’d attacked her, pinning him with his body weight and superior position, ears back and tail fluffed up. Further back in the lobby was a group of other people; a woman and a man who looked like upper bureaucracy to Emma, a second man who wasn’t dressed right for a day in the office, and-

“Dietrich?” Emma said, puzzled. She hadn’t _heard_ anyone say that Dietrich had been stolen as well; but Arik’s father had been so why not? Maybe Dietrich had just been overlooked in the commotion about the Jagdsprinz-

He looked over at her. His expression was one of earnest, slightly apologetic confusion and it tripped her up, because Dietrich didn’t do that sort of emotion she was pretty sure-

“ _Entschuldigung,_ ” he said. “ _Ich denke, dass Sie mich mit jemandem verwechselt._ ”

“Uh…”

That was- _German,_ the German that had been current when she’d been young and it wasn’t even the Swiss German she’d learned being in Martigny, it was _Standard_ German.

Emma took a second look at the people and realized something horrible.

“Dom,” she said. “Let him up.”

“He _attacked_ you.”

“Dom- their clothes are out of date,” Emma told him. “This was grandparent-fashion when _I_ was a kid.”

She gave him a second to work through the implications of that. He got off the man he was pinning down very quickly once he’d realized what she’d said.

The man Dom had been pinning got to his feet, looking wary as he fixed his hair and brushed his clothes off. Dom had backed away, so he was standing next to her, but this blond man didn’t seem inclined to do the same.

Emma didn’t recognize him, but that didn’t mean very much. On sight, of the Nations who would have been alive during the right period for these clothes, she knew her _Bisnonno_ and his co-parents and his siblings, and Dietrich, and Marschall Braginski and _Razanás Zhōnghuá_ and Shahanshah Forouzandeh _Razanás_ Humanity Imperial.

“ _Polizei_ ,” she said, gesturing between herself and Dom. It was the only word she was certain that Martinacher- the only Germanic language that could really be said to be _thriving_ instead of dead or just managing to survive, the child of the various Swiss Germans and Rinnrdrusk- and Standard German shared.

Was the French she’d learned in Martigny the same as Standard French, though? She couldn’t remember.

“ _Vati_ ,” one of the men said, and Emma didn’t know Standard German well enough to follow the rest of what he said but _that_ word-

“ _Deutschland_!” she blurted, unable to contain herself.

The dead Nation looked back to her, obviously surprised at the outburst, and that she suddenly knew who he was.

“What?” Dom asked.

“ _Drützerharc_!” Emma told him, providing his name in Rinnrdrusk, and Domdruc’s ears went back in alarm.

Germany was back, and a demon was threatening, and they’d lost the Jagdsprinz.

“Emma,” Domdruc said. “We can’t mess this one up.”


	6. Harder They Fall

One second, Gilbert was on the main floor of Imperial Intelligence, doing a walking inspection with Don keeping half an eye on him- and the next, there was screaming.

It took him a few seconds, because there was a sudden feeling of having his feet cut out from under him, of tripping but never hitting the ground; and Don was gone. They’d worked together so long that Gilbert was able to tell, now, when the AI was paying attention to him, or when he was around. It was a sort of presence, and now it was gone.

Something else was gone too, and his memory had to provide what it was because it had been so long since he’d had any people directly- he existence still depended on Dietrich’s and he always had a vague sense of Europe nowadays but now _that_ was gone too.

Gilbert went cold all over. This feeling, this lack of _anything_ the feeling that should have been death- he knew this.

There was still screaming.

He clenched his fists and glanced around.

Somehow he’d ended up in some sort of industrial kitchen. He recognized the form but not the place- he knew all of the Imperial Residence’s kitchens on sight now, and this wasn’t one of them.

Cristoforo was here, looking a bit dazed and shocked still; and Rahel who was just now moving past blank incomprehension to pure anger; and Arik who he thought for a moment was the source of the screaming because his grandson looked deeply shaken and more than a little terrified but he wasn’t the one making that noise, it was-

Serafina DiAngeli?

She was collapsed on the floor, shrieking in ear-splitting terror and flailing, scrabbling at the smooth tiled floor with her fingernails, eyes wide and sightless in panic. Gilbert had no idea if there were words in the screaming or not, and he had to fight the urge to clap his hands over his ears.

Arik unsheathed his knife and brought the pommel down hard on a sensitive spot on his mother’s head, knocking her out. The kitchen was blessedly quiet for a second, and then the blade dropped from his nerveless hands with a soft ringing clatter of steel against porcelain.

His grandson had just been crouching on the floor but now he dropped to his knees and hunched over, hugging himself and shaking, just a little.

Cristoforo and Rahel could take care of themselves; and he really didn’t care what happened to the Speaker of the Pict. His grandson was hurting.

Gilbert knelt down in front of him and held his shoulders.

“Arik?”

“There’s no magic,” his grandson said, voice wavering on the edge of tears. “There’s no- it feels _wrong._ It’s even worse than Berlin after Martigny it’s so _empty_ it’s _dead_ here I can’t even feel Isolde I can’t feel _myself_ I’m _alone-_ ”

Arik’s tone had ratcheted up to near hysterics, and Gilbert wondered, not for the first time, just how much Pict was lurking in his psyche that the rest of them had just never noticed. The Pict were a- he wasn’t sure exactly what, but they spoke as a collective through Serafina, so something like a hivemind; and _she’d_ just fallen apart completely. Gilbert would bet good money that whatever could suppress Nationness could cut off an individually-bodied Pict from the group, something that wasn’t really meant to happen and something that they, quite possibly, just weren’t psychologically equipped for in the slightest.

“ _I’m_ here,” he told Arik. His grandson’s _‘alone’_ felt entirely too close to his thoughts about the Pict, and he grabbed the man’s head. “You’re _not_ alone, Arik; _I’m_ here and so are your other grandparents-”

“I want _Elti,_ ” Arik whispered.

“There’s only one thing that does this, Arik,” Gilbert said, trying not to be hurt that he wasn’t really wanted. “And you _have_ to hold it together, or the demon’s going to get you. You _can’t_ fall apart.”

Arik swallowed down a sob and nodded.

“Okay,” he said. His voice was still wavering a bit, but that commitment was important. “Okay.”

“Good,” Gilbert told him, and pushed himself to his feet. “Now pick up your knife and let’s take a look around, General.”

Invoking his grandson’s rank seemed to help some. Arik retrieved his knife and stood, and looked a bit steadier for it.

Together, while Cristoforo silently looked over Serafina and Rahel stood in the middle of the large clear area of the kitchen, indignant about being cut off from her people and furiously muttering things to herself in Hebrew, the two of them gave the room a thorough look-over.

A display told them it was 7:16- morning or night, Gilbert had no idea. There were no windows in this room to take a look at the lightning outside; but given that no one was in the kitchen with them, he was going to say morning.

It was a very large kitchen, easily large enough for an office building. He didn’t know a lot about cooking, but there seemed to be a wide array of specialized items in the cupboards and hanging on the walls and Arik found a padded cabinet of fine china, so evidentially this was a place used to fancy dishes.

Gilbert took a plate out of the china cabinet and examined the designs on it. The coat of arms in the center of the dish was naggingly familiar, but it took him a few minutes to place it.

“The Governor of Freiezuno,” he eventually recalled, and replaced the dish.

“So this is Kharad?” Arik asked.

“I fail to see what business a _demon_ would have in Kharad,” Cristoforo called from across the kitchen. He’d gotten Serafina’s unconscious body bundled up against a wall.

“Maria and Sebastian are in Kharad,” Arik said, and then looked horrified at himself.

 _“Later,”_ Gilbert told him sternly. “ _Later,_ we worry about anyone else. Right now, we worry about _us._ ”

“But-”

“You can’t save anyone if you’re dead.”

There were four doors in the kitchen. One he didn’t open because it was obviously a walk-in freezer. The second was next to the bank of stoves and ovens opened up onto a smaller mess, or a buffet cafeteria, which showed no signs of having been recently occupied. The third opened onto a hallway- an open conjunction of hallways, really, and a staircase going up.

The fourth door opened to a small passageway, only a two or three steps long, with another door at the other end. Gilbert would have tried it, but it was on a swipe key and he didn’t have anything to force it with.

Rahel had pulled out all of the kitchen knives she could find and laid them on the counter. When Gilbert turned away from the last door, he found her testing them, one by one.

“Knives won’t do you much good against a demon,” he told her.

“We need _something,_ ” she said. “ _I_ didn’t come armed like you and Arik did, but no demon is getting me without a fight.”

Cristoforo was taking his own look through the cabinets, but whatever he was hoping to find, he didn’t seem to.

“Gilbert,” he said, closing the latest set of doors. “The stoves are on.”

Someone had been here recently, then. There weren’t any corpses that he had seen so far, and he wasn’t about to go wandering off anywhere yet, but-

He looked over at the freezer door again. It had manual bolts; and they were unlocked.

The door was well-balanced, and opened without him exerting much effort. The cold struck him in the face and made his skin prickle at the sudden drop in temperature.

Rahel ghosted up behind him, with a butcher knife, and he glanced over long enough to raise a disbelieving eyebrow at her.

She pointed to a spot in the freezer, and Gilbert noticed white wisps of condensing breath from behind a shelving unit.

“Hey,” he said; and now it was Rahel’s turn to look at him in disbelief. “No demon. _Eiáuo kaéh’Zagvḥa_.”

The Honalenier Trade Creole _‘I am one who keeps their oaths’_ was a stock phrase in most languages now, lifted straight out of the original language and used mostly in important situations, or to underline the sincerity of the speaker.

“ _Kéihraos úRazáágdh_?” came the standard reply, whispered by whoever was hiding behind the shelves.

“ _Yágdh hnaḥri éimha_ ,” Gilbert said, closing the formulaic exchange; and the person- a man, it sounded like- behind the shelves started talking.

“It was _here,_ ” the man said, in regular Farsuá. “The monster. It- we heard the _screaming-_ ”

“We?”

“I- I’m Halmina, I’m one of the prep cooks, there were- Sahdia, Usama, Fidad, Manshur, and- Haskander and Idris, the chef and kitchen manager, and Ibt’hajj one of the security officers, we were just getting breakfast ready for the Governor and her family and the security night shift-”

“The others are all kitchen staff?” Gilbert interrupted.

“Yes.”

“Where are they?”

“Pantry,” Halmina told them. “They- it only opens from the outside once it’s locked down and they had salt in there and someone was going to have to let them out and this was the only other place to hide.”

“You were expecting an industrial freezer to stop a demon?” Gilbert asked, doubting the man’s judgement skills.

“They live in fire, right?” Halmina said. “So- we didn’t _know_ for sure it was a demon but it smelled- _hot_ and hot wouldn’t like ice.”

All right. That wasn’t the _worst_ logic, and they’d gotten the salt part down.

“Well how about you come let them out of the pantry?”

Halmina crawled out from behind the shelves and stopped short at the sight of them.

“You don’t work here,” he said.

“Nope,” Gilbert said. “General Beilschmidt, Imperial Military and Intelligence; and the State of Israel-”

“ _Razanásan,_ ” Halmina whispered, wide-eyed.

“Not exactly,” Gilbert said. “Not right now. But- hey, you know your history? We’ve got _Razanásan Vaticanae_ with us, so if you can get us into that pantry and maybe show us where you keep the household supplies, we can start doing some damage.”

* * *

It had taken a bit for them to get the others to calm down, made more difficult because this wasn’t necessarily a situation that called for _‘calm’_.

Their mother and uncle and grandmother had lived in Honalee all their lives, and this was all _wrong_ in a way that was settling in their bones in a way they didn’t really like.

Hungary hadn’t been Honalee by a long shot, but Árpád had never had a day, even when being held captive by the Ramman where they couldn’t use magic to affect much, when they hadn’t been able to _feel_ magic.

It was worse for Amphitrite and Kore than it was for Arion. Arion was magic _al,_ but didn’t really do magic himself. Their uncle couldn’t really communicate now, and Árpád was trying to fall back on their knowledge of regular-horse behavior to try to interpret, but it wasn’t the same at _all._ They needed _words._

Seeing his mother and Amphitrite so- _small_ was freaking them out a little, too, and that wasn’t helping the trying-to-communicate situation. They knew an intellectual way that they were on something of the same power level as a Nation or any of the standard Kings of Honalee, but it wasn’t like they’d ever felt themself before so that change was mostly a frustration and deep-set unease at losing a sense they’d had all their life.

They’d felt Kore Despoina and Amphitrite Kataiis’s presences before, though, and now that they were gone-

Árpád’s mother was supposed to feel like- well _all_ of the Kings had a sort of gravity to them but Kore Despoina’s was the attraction of a warm spring day, where you could run under the sun and never get hot, and the cool flow of streams over damp rock, the smell of turned earth and grass in the rain.

Amphitrite Kataiis’s was the spread of the sea, blue and grey and green, never knowing if it was warm or cold until you jumped in feet-first and then the double-pull, of dappled sun filtering through the surface, a promise of home and safety and air but then below the deep dark, mysterious and enticing, the challenge of seeing how far you could go.

But they didn’t _have_ that now. Their power was locked away, wherever Árpád’s own had gone, and now they were just- _people._ Two woman who passed for human, Kore looking grubby and uncared for in her work clothes and windblown hair and Amphitrite vaguely ridiculous in a pool of silk robes and too-heavy jewelry.   

Árpád wasn’t really sure where they were, besides that there were no windows and it was cool and there were an awful lot of computer monitors around. He’d been _in_ security headquarters for buildings before, and this seemed like it might be something the same, except all the electronics were dark.

They found two doors to the room on an inventory of the surroundings, once they’d gotten Arion to settle onto the hard floor and their mother had huddled up against her brother, their grandmother standing tense, uneasy guard as she tried to regain some of her dignity and project her usual aura of power with nothing but her own will. 

The door to the right of the main collection of monitors opened to a larger space, filled with rows and rows of server banks. Árpád didn’t really know anything about that, so they closed that door, fiddled with it trying to figure out how to lock it, and then gave up and just moved to the other door.

That opened onto a bare hallway. There was a door on the left wall about halfway down, and another exactly opposite at the other end. It was very brightly lit, and sterile.

Not very comforting or welcoming, but something to work with.

So a choice, now- they were Jager and a Witchbreaker, and had a duty to investigate anything that smacked of witchcraft, which definitely included _this._ But there was his mother and her family to consider, too.

They also should have a partner to go with them, and for a moment Árpád sharply missed their wife, though they wouldn’t have wanted her in any sort of situation like this. They’d been working together as a Witchbreaker pair for centuries and that sort of familiarity wasn’t something you could replace.

But none of their family members, here, seemed like they would be much help at the moment.

“If I went to look around,” they said hesitantly to Amphitrite. “Could you, um, keep things controlled here?”

Their grandmother looked down her nose at them, in one unconscious second regaining all of her haughty, imperial regalness.

“All right,” Árpád said, and went to take a look at the hallway.

The door in the side wall had a key swipe, as did the one at the end of the hall and one they hadn’t been able to see from the other room, a set of thick, heavy doors that cut this hallway off from what must have been a junction with another one.

Feeling rather silly, Árpád backtracked to the monitoring room and started searching for master keys, forcing some drawers until they found something that looked promising, and a set of physical keys as well.

One of their assortment of taken key cards worked for the side door, revealing a maze of new hallways made by cubicle partitions and moveable walls. It looked complicated and irregular and Árpád wasn’t going to go into something so tactically unsound without either working magic or backup, preferably both.

The door at the end of the hall was a bit more difficult to locate a key for, and once Árpád had gotten it open the room beyond looked very workshop-like, and technical; which again wasn’t their thing, so that was another area down.

Their last option was the heavy connecting doors.

 _These,_ the physical keys worked for- a keyhole under the swipe pad that took a couple of tries to match, a turn, a click, and the electronic locks disengaged and the pad light turned off to show the system had been disabled.

A different key undid the manual locks that the electronic ones had disengaged from, and then they were through.

What they’d thought would be a connecting hallway was still sort of a hallway, but it had been blocked off some meters further down by a security checkpoint. Swipe cards got them through that easily, and then there were another three options- a door, a staircase, and then beyond that some sort of darkened service ramp with another door leading off it.

Árpád tried the nearby door first, and found the first dead bodies. They had uniforms, but not Imperial Police or Jäger, so they thought these people must have been private security. A closer look, though, revealed a patch they knew.

This was Freiezunian military. This place was wrong to be a barracks, so some sort of government building important enough to have a military detachment as security.

This room seemed to be the main staging area. There was an office for the detachment commander, and a lounge space, and lockers for personal effects- so they commuted to work, then, there would be civilian residential areas somewhere near this building- as well as weapons. They keys Árpád had taken opened the weapons lockers and they restocked, deciding on stopping power. There wasn’t anything _they_ would have liked for that, here, but there were a few rifles so they took one and an ammunition restock; though if they kept it on energy rather than ballistics settings it would take years to run out.

Now much better equipped for a hostile environment, Árpád had the choice of stairs, or ramp.

They didn’t have a lot of information to go on here, not even in the way of hearsay or family stories. _Apa_ had done a short stint in the Jagdshall back when it had been the House-

Árpád realized they’d just admitted to themselves that the most likely explanation for any of this was _‘demon’_ , and took a deep breath.

 _Apa_ had never said much about demons, and _Nagymama_ had never been in the house; but somewhere dark and shadowy like that ramp seemed like a great place to get killed, so Árpád chose the stairs.

* * *

Edward and Joseph were centuries too young to know anything about this and Lana had been a child and in totally the wrong part of the universe to have the experience to recognize the situation instantly, but _János_ knew.

Maybe it had been less than a day but he _knew_ what the only thing that could cut off a _Seelenkind_ ’s magic like this was.

“Demon,” he told Lana, and wished that he’d been holding his magic kit when they’d been grabbed.

At least the fact that both of them had been sleeping so badly since- the murder, meant that he and Lana were both dressed. Joseph had been awake, too, but that was because of time differences between Kharad and Turin. Edward, unfortunately, had been asleep, and was only in possession of a pair of pants.

Joseph handed his sweater over to his brother, who didn’t look very comfortable in it, but running for your life without shoes would be hard enough.

“Really?” Lana asked quietly.

He nodded, and their sons started paying attention to them.

“Do you-” Joseph started to ask, and János remembered that he and Lana spoke to each other in English most of the time, and none of their sons had ever learned it- there was no point, the closest thing to it anyone used any longer was Sincom, Standard International Communication, and that was just for between ships’ crews and port traffic control. You couldn’t even really call it a _language,_ more a collection of set phrases.

“Demon,” he repeated, in Farsuá this time. Joseph went very pale, and Edward didn’t look much better.

“A kitchen, I think,” Lana said. “This is a _very_ nice room- it could even be a state room, and a state room means government and government means large, well-stocked kitchen.”

“I don’t know how much folk magic will help us.”

“We have to try something, Jansci.”

The four of them exited the state room to a long, wide hallway. There was a set of very fancy, glass-paned doors immediately across from them, and János pushed them open to reveal a formal banquet hall, filled with large circular tables covered with furniture dust covers to keep them and the accompanying chairs clean and protected until they were needed again.

Formal dining meant a way to a kitchen _somewhere_ nearby-

He and Lana put their sons to searching, and each of them took a wall. It was Lana who found the door to the staircase, on the other side of the room. They were quite wide stairs, not very steep and clearly made for ease of walking up and down. Next to them was an equally-large elevator, probably meant for cleaning carts or transporting large dishes or centerpieces that couldn’t be easily carried upstairs.

The bottom of the stairs opened to a large hall area, a T-junction; and, thankfully, a set of swinging metal kitchen doors, the type that could be locked up when the day was over but that were, when unsecured, easily opened with a nudge of foot by someone with their hands full.

János tried pushing them in, but they’d been locked- so someone else _was_ here.

He pounded on them, and waited for a response.

* * *

She’d forgotten.

Six hundred and ninety-three years she’d been doing this. Only thirty-eight years of seven hundred and thirty-two so shouldn’t she not be _surprised_ that she’d forgotten what being human was like?

But those had been Nia’s first years, and it didn’t feel right to forget them; at least not like that.

For the first time in six hundred and ninety-three years she could look Venice in the eye and not see _death,_ destruction, murder, broken oaths and treaties and promises, genocide, lies, deceit, sin upon sin upon sin upon sin down through the centuries.

Nia had been working on not being actively angry at Venice for… thirty-eight years now, as long as she’d been married to Odette. They could talk so long as they stayed on work, or things related to work, or the trouble their children were getting up to.

She’d been telling herself it _wasn’t_ the same thing as what had happened with being angry about _Vati._ She’d been telling herself that sticking to safe topics like politics and difficult politicians and the economy and worrying about their children wasn’t doing the same thing that the anger had, providing a topic that wasn’t all of the _things_ Venice had done.

She’d told herself that she wasn’t allowed to be angry so it didn’t matter unless Venice did something new and horrible, but-

Now she was looking at Venice and she was just a nervous, anxious woman who’d been caught in a dangerous situation with no information and little in the way of defensive means and she wasn’t a _Nation_ and Nia couldn’t _see_ any of it and-

Nia didn’t not want to look at her.

And yes they were in _danger,_ and she and Venice and Mosè and Luisa were at least trained for it or used to it and Marlies wasn’t and she’d need watching and they didn’t know where the demon that _had_ to have done this was or how they’d been brought here or _why_ so they all had to be alert, on guard-

But Nia felt so much _better._

“What?” she asked. Someone had said her name, and she’d been too busy trying to figure out _why_ she felt so much better- it couldn’t _all_ have been Venice, she didn’t like the woman _that_ much- to notice that anyone had started talking beyond getting Marlies to calm down.

 “We have to find out what’s going on,” Venice said again. “We need to take a look around, see if we find anyone else, see if there’s somewhere better to fortify-”

“Right,” Nia said. “Right-”

Someone was going to have to stay with Marlies- Mosè, probably. Marlies wasn’t Jäger, and didn’t know about fighting. Mosè was Jager, but his sister was a sorcerer, and would know more about any magic they came across.

But while they were both Jäger, they weren’t really _fighters._ They were both Department- well, the Zauber Regiment wasn’t part of the Departments, but the Workshop basically was Department, and that was what Luisa had been in charge of for centuries. She was well-suited for it.

Nia looked over at Venice, who was a fighter, who’d died before and faced a demon before, more times for either than anyone could count.

“You and me, I think.”

* * *

Ivan was doing his best not to pace, because they were being watched by the media and because that would mean he was putting his back to the demon.

Nico was still keeping it occupied, yes; but he hadn’t lived this long by leaving himself open to attack.

Pacing would have meant he had something else to focus on, though. He felt like he’d been hyperaware for hours, now, ever since Nia had dropped out of his consciousness. He was acutely aware of the hearty journalists and news crews who were still standing the media line despite the appearance of the demon, and the movement and emotional state of the Hunt both here and across the galaxy now that the news had spread, and the demon itself; and he was keeping an eye out on Ravenna and Odette and Isolde who turned up with Dietrich which dear God _why_ and now he had _Lovino and Antonio_ as well compounded on top of the worry for Nia and Emma and the children in the Governor’s Residence-

He was being pulled seven or eight different directions and the only way he was holding himself together was experience. Being pulled multiple different directions at once was part of being a Nation, and more than once keeping steady in the midst of those forces had been the difference between staying sane and losing it, whether for a few weeks or a few decades. He hadn’t always won that fight, but compared to some of the things that had happened- this was nothing.

Or at least he _wanted_ it to be nothing. Ivan told himself that he would be all right, if Nia- if the Jagdsprinz didn’t come out. Lord Hiruz had told him long ago that _he_ was the expected replacement for Nia; and even if it didn’t come to him there was no one alive, at least not that would be Jagdsprinz, who would hurt him like his old bosses.

But Nia had been- Nia _was-_

No. He had to stay together. Lovino and Antonio had just gotten yanked forward almost seven hundred years and had no context for this situation and _they_ were holding it together so _so could he._

They might have been close to losing it, though. Perhaps more so Lovino- he was staring at Nico with an expression of blank disbelief with a faintly-visible undercurrent of horror, Antonio clutching one of his hands as he watched his husband worriedly.

Dietrich sidled up next to him. This could be a fine distraction- focusing on _one_ bad thing of a situation, a minor one, was an old coping mechanism among Nations.

“I don’t know if I want to talk to them,” Dietrich muttered, eyeing Lovino and Antonio.

“What in the name of all things holy possessed your wife to bring _you_ here?” Ivan demanded.

Dietrich gave him on offended look.

“She’s just lost her _Elti,_ ” he said. “She’s _hurting._ I’m not going to just _leave_ her alone like that- I have to try to make her feel better, even if all I can do is be here and it only helps a little.”

“Well _I_ would feel better if you were back in Prague,” Ivan told him. “Consider the history of your soul and demons; and _go home._ Take Isolde with you if you must. There is nothing she can do here and she will know if Nia returns just soon _there_ as she would _here._ ”

“ _‘If’_?” Dietrich asked, concern creeping into his words. “It’s- you’re that worried?”

Ivan wanted to say that _of course_ he’d meant _‘when’_ ; but when he opened his mouth he couldn’t get any words to come, at least about that.

“They need to go somewhere,” he said instead, tilting his head at Lovino and Antonio. “Currently you hold their lands-”

“What, and you think that will _help?_ ” Dietrich said. “They won’t recognize their own cities. Naples and Madrid are _mine,_ and I doubt they’re feeling them at all. Their people are gone, don’t torment them by showing them what I’ve done with it since they lost everything. Keep them in Prarayer, or send them to the Aostarth manor.”

“I was not going to tell you to take them,” Ivan said. “I was going to ask you if you would feel threatened by their presence.”

Dietrich snorted.

 _“Threatened?”_ he scoffed. “By _them?_ They’re _dead,_ Ivan; and I’m more powerful now than they _ever_ were. I have a whole subcontinent and I’m _Razanás Europa_ , I’m Nation and King and I’m the final word in the political and social lives of nearly a billion people and my decisions affect the lives of hundreds of trillions more across the galaxy. The value of my total production and labor is measured in numbers too large for the human mind to ever possibly comprehend; and I’m one of the _smaller_ portions of the Empire. I’d be more worried if they really _were_ themselves on a long visit back from Irkalla- they might actually be able to cause some trouble then.”

* * *

The staff in the pantry had been very, very glad to see them all. With their help, they’d been able to acquire all of the salt supply and what fresh herbs and fruits there were; as well as sundry useful home supplies for folk magic, pencils and pens and candles and paper and thread and string, grabbed from nearby supplies closets by a couple of quick, nerve-wracking dashes to collect what they could.

So they could set up _some_ things, but this was even less effective than humans doing folk magic, because at least _that_ could, randomly or over time, draw on the ambient magic to get the results you wanted. There was no ambient magic here, locked away behind the demon’s boundary along with the rest of the world, so the Vatican and Israel kept giving a little of their own blood to what they set up, a drop or two.

Arik wasn’t a sorcerer- _couldn’t_ be a sorcerer- but he knew that they needed more than that.

If they wanted any actual protection, they were going to have to kill something to get at enough power.

He knew that the General and Israel and the Vatican knew that, because they kept giving each other _looks,_ and each had a closed look about them. Arik was pretty close to one hundred percent sure that each of them was thinking about offering themselves as a blood sacrifice, to protect everyone else. They were Nations, and they’d come back once the demon was defeated.

But Arik was more certain that they couldn’t afford to lose any of them. _Maybe_ the General, if there really was no other choice; but he was the most militant of them all, and a ruthlessly pragmatic survivor when the situation called for it. The humans would need someone like him in charge just as much as they needed Israel and the Vatican’s religious knowledge and authority.

Killing one of the Residence staff was out of the question. They hadn’t signed up for this.

 _He,_ though- Arik _had_ sort of signed up for this. He’d signed up for the Hunt, and he wanted his death, when it came, to be for his _Elti_ ’s protection or at least in her service. This sort of was, but-

None of that meant he _wanted_ to die.

Arik sat there as the Nations pulled up everything they knew of their respective tradition’s magical and mystical practices, and all the folk magic they knew of; and regarded Serafina DiAngeli thoughtfully.

“What are the proper animal sacrifices?” he asked Israel, after some minutes.

“What?” she asked.

“I know there was animal sacrifice in the Old Testament,” he said. “But I don’t know the specifics.”

“It depends what the occasion was,” Israel told him. “Generally, a lamb or a ram, or a bull. Sometimes a pigeon or a dove. If you’re suggesting we take a look at the meat freezer-”

“No,” Arik said. “But I was thinking- I don’t know if it would work. It’s not _magic_ but I don’t really know how or why it works.”

The Vatican looked up from his paper.

“What are you even talking about, Arik?”

Arik took a deep breath and changed into a housecat.

Everyone stared at him.

“Oh,” Israel said, and he came back.

“I’ve got a lot of animals,” Arik said. “And I was thinking, if I let one go-”

“We’ll need something to catch the blood.”

Upsides of industrial kitchens included very large pots and very sharp knives. The Nations looked over all of the available blades, and all three of them grumbled about none of them really being the right tool for the job, but eventually the General picked one out.

“Do animals come out of it violently when you let them go?” he asked.

“Not that I’ve ever experienced,” Arik told him. “There’s at least a minute of being sort of confused, usually.”

It served them well when Arik let go of the bull he’d taken in his childhood, back when Pwffio was overseeing his _‘lessons’_ and experimentations. The animal could have been unmanageable otherwise, and likely dangerous. Instead, the General was able to quickly and deeply cut its throat, and Israel and the Vatican switch out pots to catch all of the blood.

The human staff of the Residence looked a bit queasy, collectively, at the casual slaughter. Arik sort of wanted to reassure them that it wouldn’t happen again, but that wasn’t a promise he could make in good faith. They might need to do this again later.

The only restriction he could think of, or reasonably insist on, was not trying to bring out the unicorn or the dragon. Without ambient magic just around- well, he had no idea what that would do to anything, but he had a horrible feeling that it wouldn’t go well and it wouldn’t be pretty.

When they were done collecting, and the bull was well and truly dead, the General looked down at the massive corpse on the tile floor, clearly considering something.

“What?” the Vatican asked, looking up from where he’d begun to plan wards for the door to paint in the blood of the sacrificed bull.

“I’m just thinking about stuff,” the General answered absently. “Old stuff. Pagan stuff. Rahel, could I use the rest of this?”

“I don’t need it,” Israel told him, and the General started dismembering it.

They were going to have to find a way to dry off the floor after they cleaned all this viscera off of it, so no one slipped and got hurt.

* * *

Lana hadn’t been expecting János’s pounding on the kitchen door to be answered by the Vatican, with his sleeves pushed up and blood under his fingernails, the General backing him up with a gun at the ready; but it was nice to be in a room where people were about to put protections down.

János added himself to the planning committee, and Lana left him to it with Israel and the Vatican as they worked out what the best placement for different bits and pieces of protection magics would go best where, and what they were going to improvise, and even how much blood should be allotted for where so as not to waste any.

Protection magic wasn’t really her thing- she like theory, while János was more of a hands-on generalist. He liked the theory fine enough, but his life had been all about learning the practical and using it and coming up with new ideas. Sometimes they experimented together.

In the meanwhile, she checked in with Arik, and on her sons- still a bit shocked by their circumstances and clearly adjusting to the reality of it, but they were safer here and they had that kind of time- and then the human staff of the Residence.

They were a bit wary of her, which she tried not to take personally. Again, it was János who was better here- or at least he had the reputation for it, as _‘the Wanderer’_. Everyone _knew_ that was what he did, so no one really questioned it when he turned up in odd or unexpected places and started talking to anyone he cared to. She wasn’t nearly as well-known, publically. She’d mostly stayed in academia and research and almost totally within the boundaries of Martigny. When she did go somewhere else, it was for a conference somewhere Earth-side; or to see someone or something Honalee-side.

But the people unbent a bit after a few minutes, able to relax out of their initial reactions of _‘Seelenkind!’_ \- at least as much as they could, having not been prepared and now relying on that difference in experience and knowledge between _‘human’_ and _‘Nation’_ or _‘Seelenkind’_ to keep them alive.

* * *

The stairs took Árpád up to another complex of offices- but these were clearly permanent, and with a simple layout. A little prowling revealed a couple more offices for building security purposes, but most of the space seemed to be devoted to a mailroom, with a small attached lab for testing physical packages and-

Árpád went back to the mail and riffled through the large flat envelopes.

-diplomatic pouches and confidential reports and papers to sign. So this was the Governor’s Residence then.

That was it for the offices. They tried to apply keys to drawers and cabinets in the mailroom lab, in hopes of finding something chemical, but they couldn’t get anything to open.

A door from the office complex took Árpád into an open room with rows of seats facing a small raised area- a press room, experience told them. There would be no point searching here for anything useful.

Árpád made their way past the rows of chairs to the door they could see on the other side of the room. This door opened on what looked like a main hallway. It was wide, with nice tile floors and a tasteful, unobtrusive neutral color scheme. The doors here were dark polished wood, and Árpád picked one to their left, just because it was the first.

Beyond it was yet a third office space, like the one downstairs they hadn’t wanted to enter. This one was a little better, though- the moveable partitions weren’t quite so tall, and there was open space in some areas for desks and workstations. Árpád glanced at the contents of a few nearby desks and concluded that these were the press bullpens, office space for the Governor’s Public Relations team and the staff of the Press Director.

They were going to leave this set of offices along as they had the similar one downstairs, for the same tactical reasons- but then there was a noise from somewhere within the partitions. 

Árpád held their next breath, listening closely for anything else. They thought- someone was talking, maybe?

Rifle ready, just in case it happened to be a demon trick, they snuck through the partitions, looking for the source of the noise.

After a few corners, they found people. Their first impression was that they were likely harmless, staff caught up in whatever the demon had done; but then they took a look past the two men in the lead and the rifle came up.

“You’re dead!” Árpád exclaimed, initial shock starting to war with a bit of doubt and anxious fear.

Tomoko Honda and Ásdís Geirsdottir. Øystein Brynjarsson. These were- Csaba’s family had been dead for centuries, and Árpád allowed themself one nervous moment to glance around the area in search of their half-brother.

“You’re dead,” they repeated, when Csaba didn’t show up. The rest of HabéTech’s original executive board was staring at him, frozen and wide-eyed at the sight of the rifle.

One of the men, the short one, cautiously sidled in front of Tomoko, eyes fixed warily on where Árpád’s finger was on the trigger of the rifle, and Árpád had to tell themself that they _couldn’t_ start trembling when holding a gun like this, the butt of the rifle braced against their shoulder wouldn’t help steady it any even if logic said that this man could only be _Japan._

The other man, this one blonde- Iceland or Norway, Árpád didn’t know them apart and it could have been either of them but- well _their_ mother and uncle and grandmother had come with them to this place and Japan was Tomoko’s biological father so Norway, then, probably-

“ _Norvégia_?” they asked the man who had obviously just moved to get his attention, hoping for the barrel of the rifle to point towards _him_ instead of his family; and the man stopped, eyes narrowing.

“… _Ja_?” Norway responded suspiciously.

“It’s- what are you _doing_ here you’re dead!” Árpád said. “If Øystein’s here then where’s Csaba?”

Norway stared at him blankly. There was only a flicker of immediately-repressed reaction at his son’s name.

“ _Kjenner jeg deg_?” he asked, after a moment.

Árpád had no idea what that meant, but it was obviously too short to be an explanation to what _they’d_ asked so- so Norway probably didn’t know any-

What _had_ they been speaking in?

A quick check of memory said that it was Hungarian.

Understandable. There was no reason for Norway to know Hungarian, but he should know-

Árpád opened their mouth to repeat themself in German, and abruptly realized that they couldn’t _remember_ any.

They’d learned some German, from _Nagymama,_ because of _Großvater_. But right now that was the _only_ word they could remember in German- they’d mostly used it in Martigny and it had been a combination of standard German and a jumble of Swiss Germans and the somehow-Germanic Rinnrdrusk and French and that hadn’t lasted very long before all of that started to pull together in the beginning of Martinacher and that was _all_ they could think of right now.

The German Norway would know, Árpád hadn’t spoken in centuries and didn’t _remember;_ and Martinacher hadn’t even been official when he had died-

Wait. Wait.

No- no Norway _couldn’t_ be dead Árpád remembered when Katyusha had started growing up and _Apa_ had visited since it was sort of like having a grandchild and _Nagymama_ had showed up from Irkalla with _Großvater_ and _Apa_ had been so _happy_ to see him again and neither of _them_ had learned the languages the settlers on Uaclleon spoke, but they’d understood anyway, because they were _dead._

So if Norway wasn’t _dead,_ and no one else had reacted-

Oh no. _Oh **no.**_

They were all staring at them, because their mouth was still open and they hadn’t said anything yet.

Árpád frantically tried to recall French, but either the situation was keeping it locked away in their memory or they’d forgotten _that,_ as well. At least the German had been buried under six centuries of layers of similar languages, but they didn’t _know_ any other Romance languages-

Wait, no. Venexian. They knew- they’d learned Italian for the first settlement of Theiostea and even then the Venexian was getting more pronounced than the Standard Italian the human settlers spoke amongst each other.

“ _Comuòdo vuàltri vegnìrste sa_?” Árpád asked, hoping 28 th century Venexian’s _‘How did you get here?’_ bore at least a little similarity to the same in 21st century Standard Italian.

Apparently, it didn’t.

And there was no point in trying Farsuá, so-

Well, one other option, maybe, hopefully. Árpád couldn’t recall ever learning more than simple phrases and a few scattered words in English, and they didn’t remember _those_ either-

How did Nations _do_ this, how did they remember what their languages had sounded like centuries ago _Nagymama_ could have done this!

-but they knew a little Sincom, and that, from what they knew, was basically pidgin English. Hopefully if they pieced together a few things, they’d all finally get somewhere.

“ _Say… chown_ … _Say Norvégia Jápan-_ ”

Norway was looking them like he was seriously doubting their ability to actually _talk_ and Árpád stopped trying to mangle Sincom space traffic control phrases into something resembling _language_ and _grammar_.

In frustration, they turned to Farsuá anyway, hoping that maybe someone would pick up on the Chinese in it.

“ _Wo zhiaolou udi’enit eshuadeth, oqay? Wo zhiaolou, dan wo uyan-mna’alemani hayyo uyan-mna’firanza yedqiru bounung ohau wo qeffir uyanu tarifou; nai enit udi’wo, iya wo lem’deblya emnaou, leshey boushib zummlahu zhaliou bouheth, bu-bahath! Wo emnaou Yeqir! Wo emnaou shulta! Wo emnaou ton’Fildesh Yeq!”_

Árpád had been watching Japan as they spoke, since surely _he_ knew some Chinese, but the Chinese must have been too mangled or too distant to get through. He was completely expressionless, but Árpád was getting the feeling they were all looking for a way to get away from them.

Well- if _they’d_ come across a frustrated person with a rifle who was asking questions and demanding things in a language _they_ couldn’t understand-

Árpád sighed heavily, and lowered the rifle. Tension they’d barely noticed lowered some as well.

Focus on breathing, and calm down a little- there was no way that Árpád could just _leave_ any of them, which meant that they had to find _some_ way to communicate, even if roughly.

All right. So what did they absolutely _have_ to know?

There was a demon- they probably knew that but it wouldn’t hurt to say so. Árpád was going to help them, because they were Jäger, and it was their duty.

That had to be simpler- demon, name, Jäger. Very short sentences.

Martinacher was going to have to work. It was Germanic, at least.

“ _Da’st en Teufel_ ,” Árpád told Norway. _‘Demon’_ shouldn’t have changed, hopefully, it was still in the Jagdsprinz’s title after all.

“ _Ein Teufel_?” Norway asked, carefully.

Árpád nodded.

“ _Wir wussten_ ,” Norway said. That was probably something like _‘I guessed’_.

“ _Je’she Árpád,_ ” they said, pointing to themself; then pointed to Norway. “ _Du’sht Norvega._ ”

Back to themself.

“ _Je’she Árpád._ ”

Norway nodded, and Árpád was going to trust that he’d managed to figure it out.

“ _Je bin Jäger_ ,” they said next.

A little frown, and Norway pointed to the rifle.

“ _Was jagen Sie?_ ” he asked, sounding doubtful.“ _Dämonen?_ ”

Árpád shook their head. This had nothing to do with the rifle.

“ _Je bin **Jäger**_ ,” they repeated. “ _Jäger. Wildes Jagd. Jagdsprinz-_ ”

Norway held up a hand for them to stop, and he and Japan looked at each other in surprise. Norway glanced back at them for a moment, and they closed together to confer about this new information.

Árpád looked around awkwardly, waiting for them to finish.

“Jagdsprinz Erlkönig?” Norway asked, after a few moments.

“ _Nei_ ,” Árpád told him. “ _Er ette par Mephistopheles getuet_.”

Something about this seemed to puzzle both of them.

“Mephistopheles,” Árpád said again. “ _De Teufel ans Martigny_. _Je debe man Levie pauf Jagdsprinz Teufelmörder._ ”

At least they knew that _‘The demon in Martigny’_ had gotten across. Japan had gone very stiff.

“ _Wer war Jagdsprinz Teufelmörder_?” Norway asked. He sounded a bit suspicious.

Árpád had no idea what that meant. Thankfully, a shrug managed to get that across. They waited a couple moments while Norway tried to rephrase the question in his head, then seemed to give up.

Japan cleared his throat quietly, to get everyone’s attention.

“ _Wo sind wir_?” he asked. When that got no response, he indicated the room with his hand. “ _Wo ist dies_?”

He pointed to the floor.

“ _Hier_?”

Well, that was easy enough.

“ _De Ansitz Muzauhna von Freiezuno_.”

“Freiezuno?” Japan asked slowly, making sure to get the syllables right.

“ _Ans-_ ” Árpád started to say, and then remembered that Martinacher had taken _‘space’_ from Irkallen. _‘Nanshen’_ wouldn’t mean anything to them.

“ _Ans Shtirren,_ ” they tried instead, but neither of the Nations picked up that they meant _‘in the stars’_. “ _Nitz an Tellas._ Look, I don’t know how else to explain it, so I can’t tell you.”

Unfortunately, no one had magically picked up Hungarian in the last ten minutes, so no one understood the second part of what they said, either. Tone was easy enough, though, and Norway shook his head at Árpád, making a shooing motion with his hand, dismissing this particular line of conversation.

“ _Du’sht Jäger_ ,” he said, pointing at Árpád.

That was an okay attempt at Martinacher, and Árpád was a little impressed he’d managed to remember enough bits to put that together, but that was the wrong verb. Their name wasn’t _‘Jäger’_.

“ _‘Du bist Jäger’_ ,” they corrected him. “ _Ja_.”

Norway pulled an annoyed little expression at the correction.

“ _Du bist Jäger_ ,” he tried again. “ _Du bist… nei-ja_ hulder.”

Well that was confusing. Norway was clearly trying to ask them something about themself, but what was _‘no-yes hulder’_ supposed to mean? _‘No-yes’_ could be an attempt to ask _‘are you or are you not’_ , but then what was _‘hulder’_?

“ _‘Hulder’_?” they asked Norway.

“Hulder,” Norway repeated, then paused a moment. He brought all the fingers on his hands together and placed his wrists on his temples, so the fingers stood up over his head.

He waggled his hands back and forth in imitation of something.

 _“Oh!”_ Árpád exclaimed, understanding. “Huldrene!”

Norway nodded, and took his hands down.

“ _Je binnish huldrene_ ,” Árpád told him. “ _Je bin Seelenkind._ ”

And it was back to the others being confused.

Árpád started to think about how to explain _that_ concept, and stopped. They looked at Øystein and Ásdís and Tomoko.

None of them could understand each other, which meant the others weren’t dead even though they _were,_ and so that had to mean time travel.

None of them had reacted to their name.

“Csaba?” Árpád asked, just to make sure, one last time. “Akane? Svana?”

Japan was looking at them, expression politely blank. Norway was clearly waiting for them to say something that was actually a sentence; and the people who would be, someday, _Apa_ ’s family, at least for a couple of decades, just looked confused at the apparently-random names.

“ _Seelenkind_ ,” Árpád said, deciding to fudge the definition a little. In their case, they could do it and still be truthful. “ _Kinder von Razanásan_.”

They placed a hand on their chest, and gave their full Honalenier name.

“Árpád av Kore Despoina av Amphitrite Kataiis.”

Japan made a soft noise of recognition at the names, and bowed while Norway stood there, looking very disconcerted.

Árpád bowed back to Japan, happy that they’d _finally_ reached a point of mutual trustworthiness.

* * *

Feliciano felt a little guilty thinking that her daughter was acting more like _herself;_ but she couldn’t avoid the comparison between the woman she remembered from the 21st Century and the Jagdsprinz she’d had to live with since then.

She could see the Jagdsprinz in Nia, still, in the way she was alert and the readiness she had to attack or defend at any second, but… she was calm. She didn’t seem wound up, or vaguely angry at everything, or threatening and defensive, or sort of distant in a cool Imperial _Razanás_ way.

Nia was being- and of course Feliciano couldn’t claim to be consistently or constantly in Nia’s best graces and she was probably like this with, oh, Odette and Nico and Diana and maybe even Ivan but she didn’t know for sure- _nice._

 _Friendly,_ even.

Not- not _overtly_ or anything, but she _seemed_ friendlier. Like you could approach her. She didn’t look like she was going to snap at anyone or be intractably stubborn or glare a lot.

They were trapped by a demon and even the _Seelenkind_ could die now, here, but this was the most- the most _relaxed_ Feliciano had seen her daughter since before they’d lost Ludwig.

The room they’d found themselves in had been part of a suite. Some searching had given them evidence that it belonged to Béutros Saab.

This was extremely concerning. They hadn’t found Béutros Saab but that meant that this was the Governor’s Residence and that meant that this was where _Ravenna_ lived, Ravenna who was supposed to become her daughter-in-law; and Izabed and Constantin who were both quite good people for their planet and they were dead-

The first dead body, in the next suite of rooms over, wasn’t any of the Saabs.

It was Rosario.

“Damn it,” Feliciano heard Nia say quietly as she sank down to the floor next to her great-nephew’s body. “Damn it, Rosario, what were you _doing_ here, you’re supposed to be watching the children-”

If Rosario was here, did that mean that the _children-_

She couldn’t think like that she couldn’t think _about_ that she had to keep herself together. She’d lasted time and time again in the Martigny house before she broke and she would _not_ let some demon who couldn’t have left Hell more than a couple of hours ago do better than Mephistopheles had. _That_ demon had had _centuries_ to work up the power it had had by the time she and the other Nations had come along, and had perfected the traps and the time loop system long before she’d refused to leave anyone behind.

This demon, whichever one it was, didn’t _deserve_ her breaking down.

She forced herself to pay attention to Rosario’s dead body, and the room.

“Nia,” she said. “Nia, someone else was here.”

“What?”

“That’s not where he died,” Feliciano said. “The blood’s mostly over here, not where he is now. Someone laid him out.”

Nia started looking around, and picked something up from beside his body.

“They looked at his ID,” she said, brandishing the wallet. “You keep this in your pants pockets. It doesn’t just fall out. And his gun and his knife are gone to.”

So that was an _armed_ someone. At least the fact that they’d taken the time to lay Rosario out pointed to them being potentially friendly.

Feliciano hoped that, if the children _were_ here, it was them who’d taken Rosario’s weapons.

She and Nia took a sheet off the bed in another area of the suite to cover Rosario, and went to take a look at the rest of the floor.

* * *

Cristoforo and Rahel and János were busy doing magic on the outside of the kitchen walls, and Lana and Arik were keeping the Residence staff in hand, and that meant that he didn’t have a designated job.

So he’d been thinking.

“I’ve been thinking,” Gilbert told Cristoforo and Rahel when they came back from the hallway.

“Oh?” Cristoforo asked.

“So János and Lana and their kids turned up,” he said. “I have no idea _why_ us, but there could be other people. We should check to make sure. It could be there’s other staff that survived, at least.”

This suggestion meant calling a conference, because outside the kitchen was dangerous, and if anyone was going to go they had to be- not _expendable,_ at least not that the others were saying, but Gilbert knew what they meant.

“Kit and Rahel and János have to stay to make sure the protections stay up and to fix them if something attacks them or breaks them,” he said, _entirely reasonably,_ over the protestations of Cristoforo and János. “Arik is Jäger, but if anybody needs more magic they’d need another body, and Arik is the only way we can avoid killing people. Lana isn’t a fighter, and neither are Edward or Joseph or any of the staff. _I’m_ a fighter, and I’ve been in a demon-infested house before. I’ll go by myself.”

“You will _not_ go by yourself!” Cristoforo protested.

“At _least_ take the security guard,” János said.

“Security guard’s human.”

“Then get her to make you a map of the building,” Rahel told him. “If you won’t take a guide you’ll need _something._ ”

Some more arguing later, Gilbert had worked the others around to that plan, and Ibt’hajj drew him a map of the area.

“That’s the nearest weapons store,” she told him, pointing at a room in the sub-basement. “I’ll give you my key and you can take mine.”

The direct route from the basement to the sub-basement was an unlit ramp behind the stairs. It was a great spot for an ambush, and Gilbert, remembering the basement in the Martigny house and the things that had lurked in the dark there, took it at a quiet run.

Ibt’hajj’s swipe key opened the room marked _‘Security General Quarters’_ on the map she’d drawn him, but he wasn’t sure how felt about finding some of the weapons lockers already open. Sure, some other security could have come to get their weapons, but that meant that somewhere out there were twitchy humans with military-grade weapons on the lookout for anything out of place.

It was a good set-up for a _‘shoot first, ask questions later’_ type of situation, and Gilbert resolved to proceed carefully. Normally he wouldn’t be worried, but the people in the kitchen couldn’t afford to have him dead, no matter what he’d said to convince them to let him leave.

He eyed the dark ramp when he left the security quarters, and after a few moments, decided not to risk it again. The stairs to the security offices on the ground floor right next to it were properly lit, and that counted for a lot.

* * *

“I can’t believe I’m related to him,” Hengda said quietly.

Damir looked up at him. They hadn’t left the Residence once they’d delivered Béutros Saab’s confession letter to Marschall Braginski and were still within the Hunt’s site cordon, sitting with his mother.

His mother wasn’t in a _bad_ way, at least not on the outside, but Damir wasn’t about to leave and risk having her get bad news without anyone there to support her. Her aunt Marlies was probably in there, after all; and of course _Tante_ Nia and General Beilschmidt who she reported to and Emma Miccichelo, her second-in-command. Maybe she wasn’t as close to any of the people they could only assume were trapped in the Residence as Ravenna Saab or Marschall Braginski, but they still meant something to her.

“ _Seelenkind_ is a word that gets used a bit liberally, nowadays,” his mother said to them, eyes still fixed on General Agresta where he sat just out of arms’ reach of the demon. “But _that’s_ what it really means.”

He’d been going one-on-one against the demon for- Damir didn’t know how long now, a while anyway.

Zannah had her back to the whole scene, for understandable reasons, and Damir squeezed her hand reassuringly.

“And,” Hengda said. “You’re _sure_ those are-”

“South Italy and Spain,” Mäelle Beilschmidt said. “Yes. I didn’t see them often, but-”

“Is that going to be a problem?” Damir asked his mother.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I don’t really know what happened. But if the demon can pull people out of Irkalla…”

 “Well,” Zannah spoke up, albeit softly. “I’m worried anyway.”

“Oh?” Hengda asked, moving so he was next to her, and could lean into her.

“Béutros Saab,” she said. “His letter- he said that he was being _controlled_ by something.”

“Do you think it was the demon?” Damir asked.

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “No, I _know-_ that’s not how demons work. If it had already been summoned, maybe, but this _has_ to be new. Only Cassiel Navin ever managed to bind a demon, and if you can’t bind it it’ll just kill you. Béutros Saab might have been fey, but he wasn’t _Cassiel Navin._ ”

“But your teacher was going to summon a demon,” Hengda said, puzzled.

“She,” Zannah told them. “She figured some things out. I don’t if they would have worked but she had _some_ ideas. But its-”

She took a breath.

“Any sorcerer strong enough and smart enough to coerce Béutros Saab into _killing people_ would be plenty strong enough to summon a demon- maybe even to do it from far away, or have an immediate exit plan so they wouldn’t get caught by the demon right away.”

“You think that whoever the witch,” Hengda said. “They’re still out there?”

Zannah nodded mutely.

“They’ll be found and brought to justice,” Damir reassured her, squeezing her hand again. “They can’t hide from the Hunt.”

* * *

Árpád’s Martinacher and Norway and Japan’s combined knowledge of German and Norwegian had been serving them okay, for the most part, to stumble their way through the rest of the necessary communication. Árpád had managed to ask if they’d seen anyone else around, and gotten a negative answer.

Right now, they were in the tricky business of asking opinions, because Árpád knew they had to be taken somewhere safe, but they weren’t certain that the room he’d left his mother and uncle and grandmother in was it- and they also weren’t certain that adding dead Nations and their children wouldn’t make a bad situation worse, somehow.

To buy time to think, they were trying to ask Norway and Japan what they wanted to do. They’d managed to communicate that they wanted _out,_ and if not that- well, something else. Árpád wasn’t sure _exactly,_ because anything more complicated than very simple abstract or concrete concepts that could communicated by saying some words and pointing, or some quick charades, was really hard to get, but probably what they were asking for was _‘safety’_.

They were in the middle of trying to get across their request to know what exactly they meant by _‘safe’_ when there was the distant sound of a door opening.

Everyone froze.

“I _heard_ you talking!” someone called- in _Farsuà,_ thank God. “I won’t hurt you if you don’t hurt me; so who’s there!”

Árpád gestured to the others to stay put, and reached for the rifle again. They crept towards the confluence of two pathways in this mess of semi-permanent office spaces, which would hopefully have a line of sight on whoever was speaking.

“Jäger!” they called back, raising the rifle to sight down the direction the voice had come from.

They felt a little silly, a moment later, when General Beilschmidt peered around the corner with his own acquired rifle at the ready. There was a split second where both of their barrels were trained to center-of-mass, and then they relaxed.

“Thank _God,_ ” Árpád said, and darted forward to grab General Beilschmidt’s arm and drag him to the connecting pathway where he’d found Norway and Japan and the others.

“Hey-!”

“Talk to them for me!” Árpád said, and pushed him around the corner to face Japan and Norway.

“ _Fucking-_ the _hell_ is _this!_ ”

“I don’t know!” they exclaimed. Norway and Japan seemed a bit taken aback at the General’s sudden appearance, but that could have also just been the fact that he and Árpád were talking in Farsuá. “Demon! Probably! But I can’t remember any French or German-”

“You can’t remember any _German-_ ”

“-and I need you to explain things to them, this demon must also be into time-travel because I said Csaba and Akane and Svana’s names and they didn’t recognize them and they didn’t know who Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor was and they’ve already asked where they are and I couldn’t _explain-_ ”

“You can’t remember any _German,_ ” General Beilschmidt repeated, evidently hung up on this point. “Your grandmother would be very disappointed in you, Árpád, _really._ ”

“I’ve been speaking Martinacher for centuries!” they protested.

“ _That’s_ got a lot of German in it!”

“I already feel really stupid, okay?” Árpád said. “We’ve been reduced to pointing at things and charades so could you _please_ explain to them where and when we are, and ask them if they want to go to some safe room, if you’ve found one yet?”

“If I’ve _found_ one yet,” the General scoffed. “Kid, that room’s had all the protective ritual magic Kit and Rahel and your father could think up thrown at it.”

“ _Apa_ is here?”

More anxiety must have creeped out there than they’d wanted, because the General’s expression softened.

“Yeah,” he told them. “And Lana and Edward and Joseph, too. But they’re safe. Promise.”

“Okay,” Árpád said. “Okay. So- Norway and Japan, then, _please._ I’ve got people waiting for me, too.”

* * *

It had been a while since she’d been this angry.

No one had done anything approaching a personal attack, or anything against her people, since the _Distawydwr_ in the War of the Republican Secession. The Hunt had destroyed them, and everyone had learned the lesson well. Then, after that, the anger had just been for Venice and Prussia, and that had finally burned itself out.

But Constantin had been _hers._

It was bad enough finding him and Izabed- _slaughtered,_ and Béutros along with them; without their murders also being an obvious part of _witchcraft._

And this was _blatant_ witchcraft; this was _demon-summoning,_ this was spells she hadn’t seen since the raid on Cassiel Navin’s workshop and she didn’t need the Jagdsprinz’s power to know that _this_ had been the endgame in the theft in HabéTech’s archive that had gotten Verity and Noah Honda-Brynjarsson killed, this was a chalked summoning on the floor that had been partially washed away by the blood so much for the hope that getting rid of the demon would be _easy._

 _“Belial,”_ she snarled to herself. _“Belial!”_

Venice was avoiding her, now, and a couple of minutes ago she would have been vaguely guilty and worried about that but right now she was just _angry,_ and there was a part that was bigger than _Zio_ Cris or Odette or Ivan would have been happy to hear about that was _happy_ that she was angry like this again.

She wanted to tear this whole house down to its foundation to get rid of the evil that had been done here. She wanted to set it all on fire to burn out the death of her family, Rosario and Constantin and Izabed-

Rosario had been here, Rosario was assigned to watch the children, Reno was engaged to Ravenna and Ravenna lived _here-_

The _children._

If Belial had touched her _children-_

_Her **children.**_

* * *

Cristoforo was the one who heard the knocking, because he had sat himself down next to the door to wait for Gilbert to return. He was anxious for his friend, and wasn’t going to make any pretense otherwise.

It was a very insistent knocking, more like pounding, and as he stood to answer it he heard a muffled voice ask for sanctuary in the name of God and Jesus and the Blessed Virgin Mary; and he wasn’t about to deny anyone who asked like _that._

Even with that, though, he slammed the door shut as soon as he got a look at who was on the other side.

Everyone else in the room looked up at him, and Cristoforo was suddenly conscious of what he must look like, with his arms spread as though he could block the doorway himself, his back pressed up against the doors for support and some certainty in the world as he tried to fight down panic.

They were _dead;_ and yes there was an excuse for one of them but _she_ was _human_ and that could not be possible.

He wanted to say it was demon trickery; but if the demon had wanted to deceive him into inviting it past the protections on the kitchen, it would have been Giovanna standing there instead. And he hadn’t felt anything _wrong_ about the people who’d shown up, just the entire situation.

The demon was almost certainly responsible for this, yes; but he had to be as rational as he could about this, and that meant admitting that instead of being a demon’s trick, it was simply something very, _very_ unnatural.

“Eglantine,” he said, trying to keep his voice even. “Eglantine- it’s your mother and your grandfather.”

* * *

General Beilschmidt and Csaba’s family were waiting for them when they came back with their mother and uncle and grandmother, at the foot of the stairs by the dark ramp Árpád had avoided earlier, that went up to the basement and the kitchen the Vatican and Israel and _Apa_ had turned into a safe room.

Árpád could tell that their grandmother was rather bitter about having to be seen in such a powerless condition, because she was being very stiff and formal and even a little… snarly, which they’d thought only the Jagdsprinz and Marschall Braginski did when _they_ were angry. Amphitrite hadn’t snapped at anyone yet, but she was on the edge of it if pushed wrong.

Their mother and uncle were taking it better, but neither of them had ever invested as much in power and authority as Amphitrite had.

All the same, General Beilschmidt gave all of Árpád’s family their space when they arrived, after a cursory greeting to Amphitrite, and Norway and Japan took their cue from him.

They traveled the ramp as group, for protection, just in case. The demon had shown up yet that any of them had seen; but that was no reason to start trusting anything.

The dark of the ramp hadn’t really scared Árpád at all, but it was still such a relief to see the protections written on and carved all over the wall that separate the kitchen from the hallway, and recognize _Apa_ ’s writing and spells among the religious things they could only vaguely place as something Christian, or related to it.

It felt a bit like coming home.

General Beilschmidt was the one who rapped on the door.

“Who?” they heard a very suspicious Vatican ask from the other side.

“…Gilbert,” the General said, nonplussed at the tone. “What, who did you _think_ it was?”

“You can never be too sure,” the Vatican informed them, and Árpád heard the door lock open. “We had-”

The kitchen doors opened enough for him to see the group they’d brought with them, and he stopped.

“I know it’s a surprise-” the General started to say.

“No,” the Vatican sighed. “No, Gilbert, we had our _own_ visitors while you were exploring-”

Muttering an apology, Árpád pushed past the two of them to get into the kitchen. General Beilschmidt had said that _Apa_ was here and that he was safe but they had to make _sure-_

There were more people in the kitchen than they’d expected- a bunch of people Árpád didn’t recognize, which meant they probably worked here; a man and a woman with Lana who he also didn’t recognize but Lana must have known them, given how much and how fast they were talking; and-

“Arik!” they exclaimed, surprised.

“Wait, _you’re_ here?” Arik said. “Why are _you-_ ”

Árpád missed the rest of whatever Arik said, because _Apa_ swopped in and hugged them, tight enough to put uncomfortable pressure on their ribs. Árpád forced their arms free to return the hug, just as tight.

Time had dulled the capture on Theiostea some, but there were times when they just _had_ to see each other, to make certain. It wasn’t just horses and being married that kept Árpád at _Nagymama_ ’s horse farm- it was home base, a certainty, and a sort of promise that there was somewhere where _Apa_ could always come to find them, or find out where they were.

“ _Apa_ ,” Árpád said into his coat. Their father was dressed Steppean, complete with the stiff embroidered sash of a sündeyalacgh. They could feel the embroidery pressing into their jacket. “ _Apa_ , I’m so glad you’re okay.”

“Me too,” their father said. “Me too- Árpád-”

“No, _Apa_ , I have to say something first,” they cut them off. “This is a _demon_ and it’s acting like the other one, and- look, _Apa,_ there’s _time-travel_ I’m pretty sure and I found some people and I’m sorry, it’s probably going to be really awkward.”

“What do you mean, it’s going to be really-”

 _Apa_ made a choked sort of noise, and Árpád squeezed him tighter.

“ _Øystein.”_

They could get through this. They _would_ get through this.

* * *

Feliciano was more familiar with her daughter’s anger than she wanted to be, but in a way it was a relief to be able to tell that this was a possessive, fearful sort of anger.

They’d moved on to the next suite in the row, on the other side of Izabed and Constantin’s. This one looked like it had been unoccupied, but Nia was still tearing through it.

Feliciano reached out to touch her shoulder as she slammed a linen cabinet shut.

“Nia-”

“What sort of _short-sighted, egotistical, **overconfident**_ excuse for a sorcerer summons a _demon?_ ” she demanded, pulling open the drawer on the hall side table. Feliciano had no idea what she was even looking for. “What _possible_ reason-”

The hall side table didn’t have anything interesting in it, and Nia shoved the drawer shut. That had been the last thing she hadn’t looked at yet in the suite.

“I’m sorry,” Feliciano told her.

Nia narrowed her eyes.

“For _what?_ ” she asked suspiciously.

Trust, Feliciano reminded herself. They were trying to _trust_ each other; but right now she was just angry and it wasn’t at _her-_

“That Izabed and Constantin are dead,” Feliciano said. “And Rosario. He-”

 _‘He shouldn’t have had to face a demon alone’,_ she was going to say, but Nia cut her off.

“He’s assigned to watching the _children!_ ” she burst out. “He- with Emma and Domdruc Filfaraskind but _they_ weren’t there-”

Feliciano stepped closer, and hugged her.

“They’re going to be fine,” she said. “They’re smart children, Nia-”

“They jump into things without thinking properly!” Nia protested, but surprised Feliciano by actually hugging her back. She’d expected it to be- maybe not awkward, but she certainly hadn’t expected a return hug. “They figure out they _can_ do something and then they just _do_ it!”

“If they’re here then they have Emma with them,” Feliciano reminded her. “Emma will fight _anything,_ that’s why you put her in charge, and she’s good at getting out of things. She’s got the experience to counterbalance her impulses, they will be _fine._ ”

Nia’s hands tightened on the back of her suit jacket.

“If they’re _not,_ ” she said. “If the demon-”

She didn’t seem able to finish the sentence, but Feliciano heard the fear, and a bit of the anger and the approaching edge of the grief that _could_ come back.

“I know,” Feliciano said. “Nia, I’ve- _we’ve_ done this before, I _know._ ”

And if the children _weren’t_ all right- Feliciano had seen what losing family to a demon had done to Nia before, and if the children weren’t all right then there was an awful lot that Feliciano would do to _make_ it all right.

They stayed holding each other long enough for Nia to calm down a little; but it got awkward after they pulled away, because Nia _made_ it awkward. They’d had a family moment and for some reason Nia couldn’t _handle_ that and it was ruining the nice feeling Feliciano had had, and replacing it with quiet, bitter frustration.

They were _trying,_ she told herself, even if sometimes it felt like _she_ was the one doing most of the trying. Nia wasn’t good at forgiving, and hadn’t had to do it the same way she or any of the other Nations had, and it was just going to take time, like everything else.

But Feliciano still sort of wanted to go find Ivan, once they got out of this, and tell him he needed to sit her daughter down and tell her about how Nations forgave each other because then maybe they could finally get past this.

The next suite over had giant claw marks scored down the outside of the wood door. The door itself was locked, and Nia knocked on the wall to avoid getting a fistful of splinters.

“Sebastian?” she called. “Maria!”

One of the claw gouges had passed close to the door knob, and Feliciano put pressure on the wood until it cracked. Nia drew her sword- thank God that the Hunt dress uniform meant a knife for the officers and the Jagdsprinz’s sword for her- and they managed to hack the lock out and push the door open.

The rooms beyond must have belonged to Ravenna, but there was no sign of her. That could have been good or bad, but at least there also weren’t any signs of an attack, or any other sort of struggle. There was no blood, and Feliciano couldn’t see any destruction-

A protection spell had been burned into the back of the door; or at least Feliciano had to assume that it was a protection spell, because she couldn’t think of anything else that would have been put up so recently. It was a complex thing, trailing off onto the walls on either side, full of designs that probably meant something and writing that she could identify as Irkallan but not read. The only things in the spell Feliciano was certain about the meaning of were the glyph-names of the Kings of Honalee, arrayed around the focal circle of the spell design in the usual pattern.

But _how?_ It looked like an even burn, and there weren’t any woodburning tools lying about or even alcohol and matches to try something ill-advised. She would have said it was done by magic if she’d seen it anywhere else, but there was no magic here, not now.

Nia was on her knees on the floor, inspecting the carpet. Feliciano thought she was looking at ash, but her daughter stood up with a hand coated in something off white-yellow, and more gritty than ashy.

It sparkled.

“I have no idea what this is,” Feliciano was forced to admit, after looking over it for a few moments.

“I can feel it,” Nia said. “Just a little. It’s magical, whatever it is.”

She wiped her hand on her pant leg, and left a streak of dusty sparkles on the black fabric as she took a long look at the protection spell on the back of the door.

“The demon was definitely up here,” Feliciano told her quietly, touching the burns in the wall. “Maybe not even that long ago. This is still a little warm.”

Her daughter looked off to the left of the door. The stairs down were out there, on the other side of the wall. They’d found nothing but dead bodies and this so far, not the children, but-

“Then we should probably go back,” Nia said. “Mosè and Luisa won’t be able to handle it by themselves. We should be there with them when it comes back.”

 _The children are with Emma,_ Feliciano repeated to herself as they walked back down the hallway to the suite they’d appeared in. _The children are safe._


	7. The Punchline

Sharp steel teeth made it easier to bite, and steel claws for nails made it easier to dig into flesh, and Nadri’s left forearm was a bloody mangle.

Maria wanted to match Nadri’s muffled keening with her own, and maybe the tears as well, because _the magic was gone._

She’d never known how pervasive magic was, before. Arik had his story of going to Berlin from Martigny when he was still young, and how much that had been wrong; but she’d never felt anything like that. There was magic _everywhere_ now, in tech and the planetary AIs and the Jäger and the wandering sorcerers and the fey and fey-blooded and even out in space again, with the ships and the Ramman back in their stars.

But now it was _gone,_ and-

Sebastian was pinching Nadri’s nose closed so she’d have to stop biting into her arm to breathe, Reno was begging with her _stop,_ he couldn’t do anything to heal her here; but Maria fumbled for the fat soft-cloth pouch of stardust she never went anywhere without and pulled at the drawstrings, desperate to open it and feel magic again, feel grounded.

The magic was gone and she didn’t know where she _was._ She’d never not known where she was in relation to anything else but now she didn’t know where _Elti_ was or _Mère_ or _Dyadya_ Vanya or Arik or Isolde or Michele or Katyusha or any of her other siblings or Emma or Rosario or Domdruc and _Sebastian,_ the only reason she knew where he was was because he was _right there._

Maria hadn’t brought them here and no one else had and so this had to be a kidnapping but even in the Shining City she’d always known where everyone important was and if she couldn’t feel them then what if-

There was no logical reason for them to be dead but she needed magic because she had to _know._

Faint sparkly white glow spilled out of the pouch, bringing an aura of magic with it, a tickle of power, and a demon.

Maria hadn’t thought that you could be too scared to scream, but now she knew you could be. The thing was objectively too large to fit under the ceiling of this room, bigger even than Lord Hiruz, the spread of its single pair of wings too wide to be out like that without touching the walls but it _fit_ and she could feel, with the bit of magic the stardust always gave off, how space was being warped to make it work and the faceless pseudo-head was _looking_ at her and it was reaching for her it could feel the magic it didn’t want to her have it it _knew_ who she was she was the Jagdsprinz’s daughter Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor and the only defense Maria had ever had was her magic.

She sank her fingers into the gritty, sandy stardust and flung out a half-handful at the demon as it reached for her, willing it to _light_ -

Too slow.

The demon raised a clawed hand and caught most of it, blocking the searingly-bright light and then there was a sharp sudden feeling of dangerous _satisfaction_ and the only door Maria could see was behind the demon so they’d have to escape some _other_ way, and she was reaching behind herself for Sebastian’s hand when the demon scattered the stardust and flicked a breeze over it.

A woman appeared in the dust.

She wasn’t very tall, only about as much as _Elti_ , but her arrival fell like a drop-hammer in what little magical sense Maria had managed to regain, here in the area effect of the open pouch. Her platinum blonde hair was caught up in a thick fishbone-braid-and-bun combination and her eyes were burning blue-tinged white when her head whipped around to stare at them-

No, at the pouch of stardust.

The demon hissed and the woman’s head whipped back, arms snapping out, one towards the demon and one towards Maria. Her hands rose and the spilled stardust came up from the carpet with the motion, and the top layers from the pouch as well-

Great wings flared and the demon lashed out with its claws but the woman shot her further arm forward, stardust following the motion, and Maria could feel how she made space crease, shunting the demon out of the room, to the other side of the wall. The stardust exploded against the closed door and the wall and burned a complex spell form there, all swirls and glyph-names and Irkallan script.

A great dull sawing noise came from the door and it rattled on the lock jam as the demon tried to claw the door down, and Maria slipped the drawstrings of the pouch around her wrist and lunged forward to grab the woman’s hand, Sebastian’s in her other- Sebastian holding on to Nadri and Reno to his sister- and took them all to the Shining City.

She choked on something wet as the city appeared before her, and Sebastian let go of Nadri to support her as she hacked up blood and spit it out on the stone pavement.

“I need water!” Maria heard Reno say urgently. “Nadri’s going to-”

The woman held a hand out flat, palm up, and thin air solidified into a diamond disk. She ran the fingers of her other hand around the edge of the disk, angled outwards, and diamond built up around the edge, following the trail of her fingers as they went around and around, making the sides of the quickly-forming bowl climb higher until she had a large, deep bowl.

She moved to holding it in both hands, and inhaled from the bowl. Water condensed _en masse,_ instantly, in the bowl, and she tried to hand it to Reno.

He motioned for her to put it down, distractedly, as he tried to get Nadri to let go of her arm.

“Na-” Maria tried to tell her brother, and hacked up more blood. She pushed Sebastian away, hoping he’d get the hint, and half-fell, half-sat herself down on the road.

“Nadri,” she heard Sebastian saying. “Nadri, there’s magic here, let _go_ you can shift here it’s okay-”

There was a rush of air and a rustling of feathers, and Kelsie was there, the tips of their black wings entering the edges of Maria’s field of vision for a moment.

“Maria! Maria are you okay-”

Maria tried to tell her friend that she’d be fine, but started hacking again. Sebastian was right, there was magic here, so why wasn’t she _healing-_

Kelsie held her while she spat up more blood, and after a couple minutes, Reno scooted over to her, Nadri successfully detached from her own arm. His hands were wet with water from the bowl, and he felt down her neck, cold water beading uncomfortably on her skin.

“You didn’t draw enough magic to get us here, Maria,” he told her. “Your body compensated but now when you keep coughing to open your airway you tear everything open again and you keep bleeding. I need you to drink some of this, okay, so I can get that healed up enough before you cough that it doesn’t tear.”

Maria didn’t want to try to drink, but she wanted to be able to breathe easily more, so she leaned out of Kelsie’s embrace and cupped some water from the bowl with her hands to drink. Reno kept his fingertips on her throat as she swallowed, whining a little in pain, and she felt everything clear up.

“Thank you,” she told him, and looked around for the woman she’d brought along with them. She had wandered off a little ways, and was looking up at the buildings with a strange expression on her face.

“Hey,” Maria said, loud enough for the woman to hear, and look back at her.

“Where are we?” she asked, in Thálassian. “This looks like Kêr-Is, but-”

“This is the Shining City,” Maria told her, a little confused and curious about how this woman would know what Kêr-Is looked like. She didn’t seem to be Thálassian; but maybe she was Thálassian fey, or a Honalenier sorcerer who did research in Lanka Kubera’s libraries. “At the end of the universe.”

The woman frowned at her.

“There is no end of the universe,” she said. “The universe is infinite.”

“Uh, well,” Maria said. “No. Sorry?”

“Hm,” was the woman’s only remark, and she glanced back at the buildings for a moment before examining the five of them.

“And what sort of a person are _you?_ ” she asked Kelsie.

“They’re just Kelsie,” Maria answered for them, quickly.

The woman frowned a little at _her,_ as well; and then suddenly-

“ _Tava istirah_ _kutra_?” she asked Maria.

“What?”

“That’s Irkallan, she just asked you where your star is,” Sebastian told her.

“I’m not Ramman,” Maria told the woman, and the woman’s frown turned into a scowl.

“Not _Ramman,_ ” she said, sounding faintly disgusted. “Horsecrap. You carry around stardust and I can _feel_ the star in you.”

She looked pointedly at the others.

“I can feel a bit of star in _all_ of you,” she said. “But you-”

She pointed at Maria.

“- _you_ have a star.”

“I’m _not_ Ramman,” Maria protested. “I’m the Jagdsprinz’s daughter!”

The woman looked extremely taken aback.

“Since when does the Jagdsprinz have a _daughter?_ ”

“Uh,” Maria said. “Since twenty years ago?”

“No,” the woman said immediately. “I would have-”

She stopped herself, and pinched the bridge of her nose, expression going pinched as she thought.

“What’s the date?” she asked.

“30 September 2746,” Sebastian said.

The woman opened her eyes to look at him incredulously.

“What sort of calendar are _you_ using?” she demanded.

“Well what do _you_ think the day is?” he asked.

“13,928 Arduhada 7,498 Zatin 44 Suryata Kerzna Kempada 1,” she answered promptly.

Sebastian stared at her for a moment, and then his eyes slid over to Reno, who actually knew the Honalenier calendar as part of being Princess.

Reno was also staring at her, and took a couple moments to even come up with a reply.

“We’re- on 7,519 Zatin,” he told her. “Today is, uh- 13,928 Arduhada 7,519 Zatin 87 Suryata Agni Devpada 62.”

“A 201 Zatin 24 Suryata difference?” Maria asked him, in Farsuà. “How much is that, _actually?_ ”

“Run all the numbers down to Suryata together and then put the commas in the right place.”

13,928,751,987 minus 13,928,749,844…

“She thinks we’re in 608!” Maria told them.

“1 November,” Reno said. “608-”

He stopped, and looked vaguely horrified.

“Did you say 7,297 Zatin 10 Suryata?” he asked the woman, switching back to Thálassian to include her again. She was looking rather cross at being talked about in a language she didn’t know.

“Yes, that’s what I said,” she told him.

Reno went grey.

 _“Oh,”_ he said in a very small, strained voice. “And, uh- what’s your name?”

“Ahes,” the woman said. “Queen of Kêr-Is.”

“Right,” Reno said faintly. “Of course.”

* * *

“I’m your _what,_ ” Irene said.

Arthur glared at- at this _woman_ who insisted that her name was Lana Walker-Kirkland, and that he was her _grandfather,_ and who had just _explicitly told_ her mother that _he,_ the Kingdom of England, was her biological father.

His alleged granddaughter glared right back and stuck her fists on her hips.

“You’re being ridiculous, Grandfather, you weren’t going to tell her,” she said. “You’ve got a complex about raising children and it’s about time you let that go. Just because Alfred didn’t want to stay with you and Matthew never totally stopped being French doesn’t mean you’re a failure at raising children. They love you, _really._ ”

She was _wrong._

“If you’re my granddaughter, you shouldn’t talk to me like that!” he said defensively.

“I’m over six hundred years old and I will tell you you’re being ridiculous if you’re being ridiculous!”

“You’re _how_ old?” Irene demanded.

“I’m half-Tylwyth a quarter-Nation and chock full of magic, Mum,” Lana told her. “I’m not going to die of natural causes.”

“Humans don’t _work_ like that,” Arthur protested. He’d been doing magic for centuries and had friends among the fairies and contacts, if he really felt like incurring that sort of debt, in Morningtown and a few of the Tylwyth Teg, and he _knew_ about humans and Honalee. They could live a long time, but not _that_ long; and they most _certainly_ could die of natural causes. They got old and sick just like everyone else.

“They don’t,” Lana agreed with him. “I’m not human. I’m _Seelenkind_ , sort of. Full- and half-Nation is _Seelenkind_ usually, but quarter-Nation with fey acts just about the same.”

“What on _Earth_ are you even talking about?” Arthur demanded.

“Wait,” Irene said, turning her head to look at him. “She said _you’re-_ so _I’m-_ ”

“Yes, Mum,” Lana said. “You’re _Seelenkind._ ”

“What does that even _mean?_ ”

“Okay, so- János,” Lana said, pointing towards a group of people in conversation. Two of them were wearing a mainly-black uniform that was making Arthur a little twitchy. The other’s outfit looked significantly out-of-place in comparison to everyone else in the room, enough for Arthur to think that it was a cultural or social difference rather than a fashion choice. He couldn’t think of any other reason for the calf-length dark green robe, closed down the side of the chest rather than the front, and what was visible of the intricacies of the thickly-laid silver embroidery on the belt-sash under the long, bright sleeveless overcoat spoke of rank or some special meaning.

“Which one’s János?” Irene asked, and something in Arthur’s memory tingled.

“Wait,” he said, as Lana opened her mouth to reply. The cut of those clothes wasn’t familiar _personally,_ but you didn’t get to be a Nation and not have a general idea of cultural information about different countries, mostly garnered through diplomacy or travel. That robe looked like _steppes_ to him, eastern Russia or Central Asia; and with a name like _‘János’_ that meant one European country in particular. “János _Héderváry?_ ”

“Yes, Grandfather, János Héderváry,” Lana said. “Both of his parents are Nations, so he’s full _Seelenkind,_ which means he’s a very powerful sorcerer and gets some useful benefits, mainly not being able to die.”

“Not _dying,_ ” Irene said, clearly not quite believing this. Arthur didn’t blame her. The only reason he wasn’t dismissing Lana out of hand was because nobody told _that_ outlandish and brazen of lie so matter-of-factly without some serious ulterior motives- and while he was still waiting for some particularly twisted Honalenier sorcerer to reveal this entire situation as an elaborate ruse, this bit of information wasn’t the sort of thing you had illusory constructs say in an attempt to shore up the plausibility of a complex glamour.

“Nations don’t die until their people leave them,” Lana explained. “They can be killed, but their people pull them back, so they don’t die. Full _Seelenkind_ don’t die so long as they’ve done magic before- even a little- and there’s magic around if they get killed, either on accident or because someone tried it on purpose. It pulls them back the same way- I’ve seen it happen. János has been killed before, I was there.”

This was- _absurd;_ and against his better judgement Arthur felt a dull ache form under his ribs. He had no proof that this _was_ his granddaughter, all grown up and easily confident in magic

(oh how he wanted that to be how Eglantine grew up all gods _damn_ whatever Tylwyth was likely doing this to keep them from rescuing her)

 but even if it wasn’t, the thought of his granddaughter being in a situation where she saw someone _die-_

He didn’t want that. Their children were supposed to safe from that. They were supposed to have happy lives, their only problems the ones you got in a peaceful, economically and socially secure life; the sort of life that Nations _wished_ they’d had.

That life was why he’d given Irene up.

 _Not like it helped her,_ a traitorous voice in his head whispered, and Arthur shoved it down.

“Half-Nation _Seelenkind,_ like Øystein over there,” Lana continued. “They’ve got magic and they’re pretty resilient health-wise, but they get old and they die. And then you’ve got _Seelenkind_ like me and Arik and Árpád, who are a mix of Nation and something else not human, so some funny stuff can happen.”

“Who?” Irene asked.

“They’re talking to János,” Lana said. “For me, the Tylwyth made me act more like full _Seelenkind,_ with the magic and the not-ageing or really getting sick; but I haven’t got the resistance to getting killed. I mean, at least that I know of, and I don’t want to test it.”

“Arik is full _Seelenkind_ on his father’s side and Pict- uh, a sort of aliens, Mum-”

“He’s _what,_ ” Arthur managed to choke out.

“We’ve got a treaty and their old enemies are on our side, sort of, because Honalenier politics, it’s okay,” Lana told him, _like that made it any better._

“There are _aliens,_ ” Irene said, sounding oddly scandalized.

“Yes, aliens,” Lana said. “Shapeshifting assimilation-y sort of aliens; and then the magical sort-of aliens who are actually stars who are more on our side and-”

Their expressions must have been a sight to see, because she faltered.

“That’s not really relevant right now,” she said instead. “Árpád is János’s eldest, he had them with Kore Despoina-”

She fumbled a moment, probably trying to come up with a way to explain how and why exactly a King of Honalee was so important; which was fine with Arthur, because he needed a moment to adjust to this new level of _what the fuck._ This entire situation just kept getting more and more surreal and implausible with every word out of her mouth.

“She’s in charge of part of Honalee,” Lana told Irene. “Which since you’re with Grandfather I guess you know about. I hope, anyway.”

“Yes,” Irene said. She looked like she was quickly approaching her threshold of _‘too much weird’_ , judging by the way she was developing a thousand-yard, zoned-out stare. “We were- before this. We were there.”

“Oh, good,” Lana said, and paused. “Um- it’s going to be okay, Mum, I promise. You find me, I’m fine. I know it doesn’t seem like it, but the kidnapping was sort of a good development. For you and me and Grandfather, anyway. We got to be a family afterwards.”

No. No.

“Anyway,” Lana continued. “So Árpád is _incredibly_ magical, since János is full _Seelenkind_ and Kore Despoina- that’s her over there- is Honalenier royalty, and I’m pretty sure they basically count as full _Seelenkind_ for the purposes of not-dying. After you get past half, or boosted partial, the magic gets exponentially weaker. The immortality always goes first, like I said, with the half- _Seelenkind_. Quarter-Nation barely even counts as magical any longer, I’m the special case. You have to keep breeding magic into the family. That’s why I-”

She stopped, with a funny look on her face.

“I,” she said. “Uh. Mum. You’ve got grandsons.”

_“What.”_

“Thr-” Lana started to say, and then stopped. _This_ expression, Arthur knew, and he didn’t like seeing it. That was recent loss, shoved away. “There were. Three. Triplets. Edward and Verity and Joseph- for Dad. Verity was murdered, a couple of days ago. But Edward and Joseph are here, and-”

Fear, now. A parent’s fear for their children.

That, Arthur also knew, quite well.

“They’re János’s, actually. You should probably meet him. And Árpád. They’re family too.”

Well, there was only one good response to _that._

“You’ve got to be _shitting_ me,” Arthur said.

* * *

They were still in the office when they heard the footsteps on the floor above them.

Erzsébet froze, Roderich half a second behind her because he’d grabbed Giovanna to hold her still.

No one had thought to grab Cassiel. He perked up, cocking his head towards the ceiling, and then dashed quietly for the concealed staircase behind the office desk.

 _“No!”_ Erzsébet hissed. _“Get back-”_

He disappeared up the stairs, ignoring her, and she silently cursed the man’s parentage. Running _towards_ strange noises in a demon-infested building, strewn with corpses, was _exactly_ the sort of thing Gilbert would have done- or Cristoforo or Rahel.

She was still deciding whether to leave Roderich to fend for himself and Giovanna so she could go and get Cassiel when he reappeared, slipping out of the stairwell and closing the door silently behind him.

“There are people up there,” he said. “I don’t know who but they’re armed and searching the bedrooms. It looked pretty suspicious.”

“How well-armed?” Erzsébet asked, thinking through different scenarios. They only had the gun and the knife from the dead man upstairs, but depending on what the people upstairs had and how friendly they were-

“Pretty well I think,” Cassiel told her.

“Did they see you? Do they know about the stairs?”

Cassiel shrugged.

“How am I supposed to know?” he asked. “But they’re not that hard to find, once you look.”

And he’d said these people were searching the rooms. _‘Well-armed’_ and _‘searching’_ sounded like synonyms for _‘experienced professionals’_ to Erzsébet.

Usually, it wouldn’t bother her. But here…

They could die. They didn’t know where they were and they couldn’t read the writing around, which meant that probably they wouldn’t be able to communicate with _anyone;_ and armed professionals weren’t the sort of people she wanted to have a language barrier with.

“We should move,” she decided. “Have you two seen any other stairs?”

“Down the hallway,” Cassiel told her.

* * *

Øystein was waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the moment when someone looked up and brightly announced that no, really, you _believed_ all this? Joke’s on you.

He was trying to convince himself that he was going to _really enjoy_ watching Ásdís rip them apart for it, but-

This wasn’t a really horrible prank, no matter if he wanted it to be or however unreal it seemed. His father was taking it deadly seriously, and there had been _dead people,_ and he hadn’t been the one to come up with those machines with the magic in them and he was probably the only person who could have; which meant that time-travel was sort of, maybe, plausible.

It provided some type of explanation, anyway, and neither his father nor Japan had tried to argue about the possibility of it. England, who he knew was one of the other particularly magical Nations, didn’t seem to have said anything either.

Øystein didn’t think he wanted to live in a universe where people could just be ripped out of their proper time and dropped into another one. He tried to focus on something else.

Like how the one person who’d found them- Árpád, that was it- had known his name.

His father and Japan were talking quietly to a woman, who must have been another Nation. Øystein knew his father was good at neutral expressions, but there was a particular one he got when he was actively trying to suppress his emotional reaction to something.

There was no good way to interrupt, but-

“ _Far_ ,” he said, sliding into the conversation. “Who’s this?”

His father linked at him.

“Israel,” he said. “She’s- explaining things.”

One on hand, Øystein felt like he should know exactly what was going on. On the other hand- did he _really_ want to know?

“When we were found,” he said to Israel. “Árpád knew my name. I’ve never-”

“You should ask János about that,” she cut him off quickly.

She said the name like he should knew who that was, but Øystein was drawing a total blank. It sounded vaguely familiar, but he’d met a lot of people and heard and seen a lot of different names in his life.

“Which one is János?”

“He’s talking to Árpád,” Israel told him, which didn’t help. There were _two_ people doing that.

“The scruffy one,” she clarified. “Looks like he should be at a cultural reenactment.”

“Oh,” Øystein said. “Why would _he_ know? Why shouldn’t I just ask Árpád?”

“They’re his kid.”

“Árpád looks like an adult to me,” he said. “Like they can speak for themself.”

Israel looked at him a long moment.

“How much do you want to know?” she asked.

“Strangers recognizing my face and knowing my name is pretty worrying,” he said. “I’m not _Ásdís_.”

“Fine,” Israel told him, with a little twitch of expression that said she was absolving herself of responsibility in this situation. “You’re János’s ex-husband and your son was Árpád’s half-brother.”

Well. That was-

“I’ve never even met him!” was the only thing he could think of.

“You hadn’t when you asked him to marry you, either,” Israel said, which was really not helpful information.

His father looked at him, and then at Israel, silently demanding an explanation.

“Business politics,” she said, and pointed between him and Japan. “You two are related, by the way; Ásdís and Øystein and Tomoko and János went into business with Cassiel and Ásdís and Tomoko got married and set one of their daughters up with Øystein and János’s son to block Cassiel out of the company, which was pretty sensible of them.”

“I wouldn’t do that,” Øystein protested. “I-”

“You did,” Israel told him. “You plotted it. For _years._ You had kids _just_ to set them up to marry each other.”

“They’d- Ásdís’s kids and my kids would be second cousins!”

“Didn’t stop you. They even all grew up together. Oh-”

She looked back to his father and Japan.

“János and England’s granddaughter are a thing, with kids even, so you’re related to him, too.”

Norway actually pulled a face at that.

Øystein thought his father could have taken that expression out a couple of sentences ago. He…

What Israel had said, how could he _do_ that?

He wasn’t that sort of person. He _knew_ better than to use children as a means to an end. That was _wrong._

* * *

“Will you _just-_ ”

Emma threw up her hands in exasperation.

“ _We_ got in here fine,” she said. “So will you just go out the hole?”

“The hard part with demons isn’t getting in,” Germany snapped back. He was trying to glare her down. She was used to it from the Jagdsprinz so it shouldn’t have bothered her; but it was catching her wrong-footed, because every couple of sentences her brain tried to tell her that this was _Dietrich,_ and Dietrich didn’t glare. He sneered, and got bitingly derisive. “The hard part is getting back out. That’s too easy.”

 “It is _exactly_ that easy!” Emma exclaimed. “The demon hasn’t been here very long, it’s not like Martigny!”

“How do _you_ know about Martigny?” France asked suspiciously.

“What happened in Martigny?” Heinrich asked.

“I told you, you’re in the future, _everyone_ knows.”

“Ah, yes, of _course,_ ” France said. “The future.”

Emma dropped out of the Italian she’d grown up with to spit invective in Farsuá to Domdruc, who was patiently waiting through the argument conducted in a language he didn’t know and calmly ignoring the way people’s eyes kept sliding back to him and his ears and tail.

“Fucking _stubborn_ paranoid bastards!”

“I’m sure they can tell you’re insulting them, Emma,” he replied.

“Why won’t they _trust me!_ ”

“Did you tell them you’re family yet?” Domdruc asked.

“They don’t believe me about being in the future, they won’t believe me about that.”

 _“Excuse me,”_ Zell said.

Emma fought the automatic urge to defer to her. _Bisnonno_ had that same tone when he was about to tell you _exactly_ how disappointed he was in you, and Marschall Braginski when he was bullying politicians.

Zell pointed at Domdruc.

“He’s got cat ears,” she said. “And a tail. Are we going to talk about this or not?”

Domdruc blinked at her, amused. He didn’t know the words, but the content was pretty obvious.

“Tell her I’m the next stage of human evolution and I’m participating in this conversation telepathically, which is how we know all their secrets.”

 _“Dom!”_ Emma tried to scold him, but she couldn’t keep from smiling. She punched him in the arm instead, and on the rebound he bumped her shoulder in retaliation, grinning.

 “He’s huldrene- kodrene,” she told Zell. “That’s- uh-”

There were an awful lot of important concepts tied up in that- the Domdruc, Honalee, the Jägerskov, Martigny, the Hunt-

“Forest spirits,” Heinrich said. “That’s the plural form of _‘huldra’_. They’re supposed to be female, though, the sort that trick human men into having sex with them and then kill them. From behind you can see they’re wooden husks, their backs are hollow. The Norwegians say they’ve got cow tails but the Swedes say it’s a fox tail. I’ve never heard anything about cats.”

Emma stared at him, and was a little comforted to see that his sister was looking at him funny, too.

“Mythology and folklore are great sources of operatic material, I know these things,” Heinrich defended himself.

“He’s a wildcat that can look mostly human if he wants,” Emma explained, correcting Heinrich’s Earth folklore. “There’s other sorts of huldrene, too- wolverines, bears, and wolves. They’re not from Scandinavia; they’re from this place called the Jägerskov in Honalee, which is-”

 _“No,”_ France said immediately, holding up his hands. “No, _no._ We do _not_ get involved with Honalee.”

“What are we _talking_ about?” Germany demanded.

“Prussia didn’t-” he started to say, then huffed and rolled his eyes and muttered: “ _Pour l’amour de Dieu, **Gilbert.**_ ”

“Gilbert didn’t _what?_ ”

“Tell you about Honalee or magic or an awful lot of other important things,” Emma told him. “Dom and I are with the Wild Hunt so will you _please-_ ”

“That doesn’t exist!” Germany exclaimed, just as Heinrich started to say: “Wait a second-”

“ _Merde!_ ” France hissed, and recoiled, looking like he was trying to come up with a way to ward them off. “ _Dieu nous protéger-_ ”

“ _Je **sais** lefrançais_!” she snapped at him.

He paused, his mouth thinning into a hard line.

“You’re from Switzerland?” Rémy asked.

“ _No,_ I’m not Swi-”

“If she’s in the Wild Hunt she’s not human!” France cut her off.

“Yeah, about that,” Heinrich said. “So you just said huldra weren’t the same thing but the Wild Hunt is usually said to be made of damned, or at least dead, spirits-”

“I’m _Roman!_ ” Emma shouted over everyone. “I’m from _Rome!_ I’m _human,_ I’m in the Wild Hunt, I’ve been in the Wild Hunt for over half a millennia and _meus proavus Christophorus Petrius est- ita **vous** claudeas,Galliā_!”

“You don’t say,” Domdruc remarked, as the others all stared at her.

“And _you_ can shut up too, Dom.”

* * *

“Nia.”

She paused and looked over her shoulder. Venice had stopped at one the windows in the hallway they’d ignored before, when they had been focused on checking the rooms, and pulled open the sheer curtains.

Nia remembered Izabed talking about when she’d gotten those replaced, soon after she’d married Constantin. Before, the Governor’s Residence had had a false wall in front of the windows- the building wouldn’t have looked right without windows, but they had been too big of a security risk on a planet that had a tradition of political assassinations. They hadn’t even upgraded the glass to be bullet-proof, though of course they hadn’t told anyone that. Izabed had had a lot of quiet arguments with her security about that.

She’d just been so _happy_ to take that wall down and put up the curtains. It had been a political statement, yes, but now she finally got to look out windows she’d wondered about all her life-

“Outside,” Venice said. “The demon. The Hunt’s here.”

“What, are they all just standing around staring at each other?” Nia demanded, coming to look.

At first glance, that was about what it looked like they were doing. Belial was out on the front lawn, by the gates- battered down, that was odd- facing Nico, seated on the road some feet away in a wide clear space no one else seemed to want to enter.

“The _hell_ is he-” she started to say, and then noticed the way the demon wavered, first leaning forward and then getting pushed back, spots of darker color blooming and fading on its skin. “Damn. I didn’t know he was _that_ good.”

“Is he doing that all by himself?” Venice asked quietly.

Nia squinted, and cupped her hands around the glass and leaned in to look.

“No one _else_ looks like they’re doing anything productive,” she said, miffed. “There’s the crowd cordon and I can see Demyanev, but he’s not-”

Some people she could identify from this far away- Ivan, because he was so much bigger than everyone else; Demyanev because he had a slightly different uniform as the leader of the Witchbreakers; Nico because he was closer; Diana because she’d been living with her for centuries; Odette because she was one of the few non-Jäger there-

“Ravenna’s out there,” Nia continued. “With Odette and Michele and Katyusha and Isolde and- _goddamnit,_ who let _Dietrich_ come!”

“Ravenna should have been in here,” Venice said, hope creeping into her voice. “If she wasn’t here then she would have been with Reno, so maybe the children _weren’t_ here.”

Nia would have liked that to be true, but there wasn’t any way to explain Rosario if the children had still been at the university.

“You _know_ better than that, Ivan!” Nia muttered angrily to herself. “Send Dietrich home!”

“He’s married to Isolde, Nia,” Venice said. “You’re her _Elti,_ and her Prince. You’re her first boss. You don’t-”

Her volume dropped.

“Your first boss is always special,” she said. “And you’ve been there her entire life. She’s not going to want to leave until she knows you’re safe. Your other children either.”

“The demon is _right there!_ ”

“Demons don’t matter,” Venice told her. Her voice had gone tight. “Not when it’s your family. Your friends.”

Nia looked over at her, and Venice took a deep breath.

“The Hunt too,” she said. “It’s _your_ Hunt. You’re the one they’re loyal to. Maybe they are wasting time just waiting out there, but they want you back. They’ve done what they can- Nico’s distracting the demon.”

“It’s probably more than distracting,” Nia told her. “I bet he’s trying to break whatever the demon’s done to block the magic. If you can do that without exorcising or killing the demon.”

“I don’t know if you can,” Venice said. “But if someone could do it, it would probably be Nico, or János.”

Someone moved, down below in the street, and the movement caught Nia’s attention.

She jerked away from the window in surprise.

“What?” Venice asked, worried. “Nia-”

“It’s _Zio_ Vino and _Tio_ Antonio,” she said. “They’re- I saw them.”

“Oh no, _Lovi_ \- how did they even find out in Irkalla they must be so _worried,_ ” Venice fretted. “If I wave do you think they’ll notice me?”

“Probably not.”

Venice sighed and pressed her face up against the window to get a look at her brother and his husband. After a few moments, her expression changed from sad to thinking.

“We have to get back to Mosè and Luisa and Marlies,” Nia reminded her.

“I know,” she said. “I just- the demon’s right there. We’ve been being all cautious but it’s been out there probably all this time.”

“They’re still expecting us-”

“That’s not what I’m talking about,” Venice said. “What if- the problem was always getting past the demon but if we know right where it is...”

“I’m not sure I’d want to attack it straight-on like this,” Nia told her. “But if you want to-”

“ _Nia, **no.**_ I meant- the demon is out front and it doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere, so maybe we could- sneak out.”

Nia looked at her doubtfully.

“You can’t just _walk out_ of a demon-infested building,” she said. “You’ve said that. Multiple times.”

“About Martigny,” Venice disagreed. “Where Mephistopheles had had centuries to build things up and warp the building and gather power. This isn’t even a day old yet. Not even half a day. It probably wasn’t here for long before _we_ got pulled here, and the Hunt would have started looking for you immediately. I don’t think it’s had _time_ to do anything- or maybe even the experience. You said it was Belial, Nia; and Belial spent its entire time on Earth before stuck in Cassiel Navin’s paperweight.”

It was a tempting idea. It was simple, and if it worked it would solve a number of problems. If they got out, she could call a Hunt on the demon.

If they got out she’d have the Jagdsprinz’s power again. She’d be- seeing things.

And even if it wasn’t that simple- if the demon started after them- her Jäger were nearby. Nico could break the barrier on the magic, if that was what he was aiming for, and then she’d have her power back anyway.

And if it didn’t work and the demon got her- she’d built the Hunt strong. It wouldn’t fall apart like it had when Gwyn ap Llud had been killed. Ivan and Lord Hiruz would hold it together, and someone else would become Jagdsprinz.

Odette, and all her children- they’d have to live with it.

But she wasn’t about to just hole up in a room and wait, not when she knew where the demon was and Sebastian and Maria might be around somewhere.

“If you think it could work,” she told Venice. “But if it doesn’t, I’m holding you responsible.”

* * *

Norway and Japan had been a find, and not one Gilbert was unambiguously pleased about. Time-travel was freaky business, and a serious threat to the continued existence of the universe-

But it had been so long since there had been other old Nations. Sure, there were Forouz and Ivan and Marco and Yao, the original group behind the rise of the Genists; and most of the other Earth Nations.

They were all the same faces, though, and they’d sort of gotten used to each other. Norway and Japan were a nice change, and he was mildly friends with Kiku at least.

He also hadn’t realized just how much he missed the shared mentality. Somewhere along the centuries, Gilbert had gotten used to other people buying into the modern way of thinking, all mutual cooperation and nonviolent diplomatic solutions and government transparency and actually taking international peace and respecting the universality of human rights dead seriously.

Norway and Japan and England had been, still were, on edge, ready to fight and waiting for the trick.

It was comfortingly familiar.

He hadn’t finished his job, though.

“No,” Cristoforo said, grabbing his hand to stop him as he started to leave.

“I wasn’t done searching-”

“I am not saying do not keep looking for others,” his friend told him. “I am saying- take someone with you this time. If it had not been Árpád and Eiliv and Kiku, you could be dead now.”

“We had this talk already,” Gilbert said. “Kit, there’s no one else to take-”

“Arik!” Cristoforo called. “Go with your grandfather!”

“We agreed not to have him go!” Gilbert protested as Arik came over. “You might need him later for more animal sacrifice.”

“That is no strategy to rely on when you are in a hurry,” Cristoforo countered. “He is a fighter and you cannot win everything on your own.”

“If I take him and you need him-”

“You have to come back, Gilbert.”

“C’mon, Kit,” he said, giving him a cajoling little half-smile. “Since when have I not come back to you, huh?”

Cristoforo smiled back at him.

“You two are _disgusting,_ ” Rahel said. “Just tell him you’re in love with him already.”

“This is not your conversation, Israel-” Cristoforo started to say.

“Who, me or him?” Gilbert challenged, raising an eyebrow.

“ _Both_ of you,” she retorted. “The levels of repression in your relationship are _abysmally_ depressing. It’s the 28th century- grow a pair and ask him on a date, you heathen.”

“You’re just jealous that you turned into a bitter old woman while I aged so well.”

Cristoforo sighed.

“I am the Church,” he said. “I do not date.”

“Then get him to marry you!” Rahel said. “ _Rabbis_ can get married, _Protestant_ priests can get married, _Imams_ can get married- it’s _just you_ who has this _thing_ with ordained celibacy. And you’re not even _ordained,_ you’re just hypocritical about it- _we_ had a child! If the two of you would just get over your damned hang-ups, you’d both be a lot happier.”

“We didn’t do that great the first time around,” Gilbert reminded her.

 _“Because of your hang-ups,”_ Rahel told him. “Also I hated you both more then.”

“What, so you don’t hate us any longer?”

“You _wish- **Crusader**._ ”

“Are you _actually_ arguing?” Arik asked hesitantly. “Or…?”

“Arik,” Cristoforo said. “Go with your grandfather and see if there are any other people in this place who need saving.”

Arik happily went straight for the door, but Gilbert pulled Cristoforo in with the hand he hadn’t let go of and kissed him soundly right on the mouth.

He pulled back after a couple of seconds. Cristoforo went very red.

_“Gilbert.”_

Gilbert pointed an accusatory finger at Rahel.

“I am _not_ repressed,” he told her, and left the room.

Arik stared at him as he closed the door behind him.

“You’ve got your own gun, right?” Gilbert asked.

“Yes?”

“Good,” he said. They wouldn’t have to detour down the ramp to pick anything up from the security officers’ lockers then. “You cover me. I’m not going to survive this just to have your _Elti_ take it out on me if you get killed.”

The stairs immediately outside the kitchen led up to a small staging room, and from there a formal banquet room.

 _“-and so **you** can shut up, France!” _they heard immediately upon opening the door between the two rooms.

“That’s Emma,” Arik said, edging around him to head for the nearest door out of the dining room. “I don’t know what she said but that’s Emma-”

“Latin,” Gilbert realized aloud, and followed him. That had been close by- out in the hallway or in the next room, maybe. “She’s yelling in Latin at France-”

It would be nice to see a friend again, though he wondered what Francis could have done to make her so angry. Tried flirting, maybe- or even just compliments. Emma was pretty married to her job and the line between _‘flirting’_ and _‘giving a compliment’_ across cultures and mindsets and time periods would be messy business.

“Leutnant Miccichelo!” Arik said loudly, to be heard over the continuing argument Gilbert could hear now that his grandson had opened the door. “Oh- Kommandant Filfaraskind-”

Gilbert pushed through the slightly too-narrow space between Arik and the doorway, intending to mediate whatever argument this was and correct what was likely a cross-cultural misunderstand between her and Francis, but-

_“Ludwig.”_

* * *

“What do you mean, _‘of course’_?” Ahes asked. “I mean, yes, I’m Queen of Kêr-Is; but you obviously didn’t know _that_ because you had to ask. And you know the calendar of Honalee even if it’s not your primary one, and you claim I’m in the future, and you know about the Ramman and even know they’re stars- so what is _‘of course’_ supposed to mean?”

They looked at each other.

“It’s just,” Reno told her hesitantly. “The day started with a demon, so why not time-traveling Kings of Honalee?”

“A what?”

“What?”

“The day started with a _what?_ ” Ahes asked. “I don’t know that word.”

“A demon,” Reno repeated. “You banished it.”

“Oh, so it _was_ a new sort of thing,” she said. “I was wondering. I hadn’t heard of anything like it before.”

“They’re not really… new,” Reno said. “They’re fallen angels-”

“I don’t know what those are either.”

Sebastian tugged on his sleeve.

“Reno,” he said quietly in Venexian. “There’s no reason for her to know anything about Christianity. It’s a human thing, nobody cared about humans then.”

“It’s a human thing,” Reno told Ahes in Thálassian.

“Oh,” she said, sounding surprised. “I had no idea humans had anything like that.”

“We don’t really- no, never mind.”

Ahes narrowed her eyes at him.

 _“‘We’?”_ she asked shrewdly. “You _can’t_ be human. You have star in you.”

“We really _don’t,_ ” Reno told her, getting a little alarmed that she’d said it again. “There’s no Ramman in us _anywhere._ ”

“So who are you then?” Ahes challenged.

“Uh,” Reno said, and glanced over quickly to the others. He had no idea how much they wanted to reveal to her about their heritage.

Sebastian nudged him to go first.

“I’m,” he said. “I’m Ludovico Tirreno Costa Kataiis av Amphitrite Kataiis, Princess of Póli Thálassas.”

“That’s not a Thálassian name.”

“It’s a family thing,” Reno told her, desperately hoping that he could avoid going into details.

“Certainly not _Amphitrite’s_ family,” Ahes said. “Who-”

She stopped herself.

“She had a human King who promised her,” she said. “I heard he was a child, though.”

“He grew up,” Sebastian said.

“And _you_ are?”

“Ludwig Sebastian Beilschmidt ap Odette von Rothbart ap Ly Erg ap Gwyn ap Llud Llaw,” he answered, going back further than he technically had to so she’d recognize names. “Son of Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor. And that’s my sister. Maria.”

Ahes looked at him a moment, absorbing all of the implications of his heritage.

“ _‘Mördor’_ I know,” she said. “ _‘Teufel’_? _‘Teophol’_?”

“Yes,” Sebastian told her. Reno was a little impressed she’d picked up on the relationship between the Jagdsprinz’s title and the word for _‘demon’_ in Thálassian. “Thálassian got it from Rinnrdrusk which got it from German- er, some humans.”

“ _‘Demon-killer’_ ,” Ahes murmured to herself, then raised her voice again. “So, Jagdsprinz- Gwyn ap Llud Llaw is a good friend of mine.”

“Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor got her title from killing the demon that killed Jagdsprinz Erlkönig,” Reno said, answering her implicit question.

“Was-” Ahes started to say, and then stopped, closing her eyes.

She took a breath.

“ _‘Her’_ ,” she said instead. “He wasn’t succeeded by his son?”

“Ly Erg is dead too,” Reno told her. “And his wife. There were _Distawydwyr._ ”

Ahes’s expression went thunderous.

“They are _outlawed!_ ”

“The Hunt got them,” Maria said.

 _“So,”_ Ahes said. “So. You, and you- you are Gwyn’s great-grandchildren. And you-”

She looked at Reno.

“-are Amphitrite’s son. _That_ one is simply _‘Kelsie’_. So _you-_ ”

She looked at Nadri.

There was a pause where no one said anything, Ahes waiting expectantly for a reply.

“You’re a witch and the Hunt killed you and destroyed your kingdom and I don’t have to tell you anything,” Nadri said.

 _“Nadri!”_ Reno exclaimed, utterly mortified. “You can’t just _say_ things like that!”

“It’s _true,_ so yes I _can._ ”

“What!” Ahes said, aghast. “I would- no! You- you have to be mistaken. I have researched magic my entire life and _never_ have I even _approached_ witchcraft! I know the laws of the Jagdsprinz’s Pact!”

“Time-travel,” Nadri told her. “Removing memories. Tearing apart a soul.”

Ahes went stiff.

“I _wouldn’t,_ ” she insisted. “I would _never._ ”

“Jagdsprinz Erlkönig said you did,” Reno told her quietly. “The Hunt comes for you in two days. Your time.”

“I-” she said. “I have studied _many_ things, but _nothing_ like that! I can’t _possibly_ have learned anything about that, much less have done it, in _two days!_ ”

“And who’s to say you’re not lying to us?” Nadri said. “None of us are the Jagdsprinz.”

“I am _not_ lying!” she snapped. “I-”

She inhaled deeply, looking like she was about to yell; but instead she clenched her fists and turned her back to them. The Queen of Kêr-Is stood there like that, just breathing, until her shoulders dropped and she uncurled her fingers.

“My work at least,” Ahes said, not turning around. “You know about the Ramman. Do people say good things about my work- my research?”

“…We don’t know what it was, _maghvát_ ,” Maria told her hesitantly. “Jagdsprinz Erlkönig let it sink into the Sea with your city.”

 Ahes’s head snapped around to look at her.

When she’d heard that she’d been declared a witch, she’d looked disbelieving, a little shocked, perhaps with a hint of incredulous offense.

Now she looked like someone had just gutted her. The pure stunned betrayal on her face was making Reno very uncomfortable.

“He…” she said quietly, sounding on the verge of tears. “He _what?_ ”

Her voice cracked on the last word. Uncomfortable silence fell.

“I,” Ahes continued, turning around to face them again. “We’re _friends._ He _knew-_ That was my life. 4,560 Arduhadene worth of research, and he just-”

Her expression went pleading.

“ _All_ of it?”

“We- we’ve never found any of it,” Maria told her faintly. She looked oddly terrified.

For a moment, Ahes drooped, and all Reno wanted to do was step up and offer a hug; no matter if she was the Sorcerer-Queen of Kêr-Is.

“Wait,” she said, looking back up at Maria. “Wait. You have none of my research, none of my notes or my knowledge- but _you_ use the _stardust?_ ”

“I found it under the mountain when I was little!” Maria told her. “I just knew it was really magical, I didn’t know it was stardust until later-”

“You’ve been _using_ it but you know nothing _about_ it?”

“It’s highly magical!”

Ahes pressed her hands together in front of her mouth.

 _“Nothing,”_ she repeated under her breath. “And the cosmos preserve us, you’ve all star in you and you haven’t managed to permanently damage the universe yet.”

She paused, and looked at the four of them sharply.

“You _haven’t_ permanently damaged the universe, _have_ you?”

“No one’s told us if we did?” Sebastian offered.

Ahes snorted in disgust.

“Sit down, all of you,” she commanded. _“Sit.”_

Eyeing each other warily, the four of them all sat down. Ahes folded her legs under her and sank to the road in front of them.

She cupped her hands in front of her, and a little star was born in the hollow space between them.

“Stars,” she said. “Are creation. Everything in the universe is made of tiny pieces that are too small to see, many different types, all of which are forged in the hearts of stars-”

“Yeah, we know that part,” Sebastian interrupted her. “Nuclear fusion resulting in stellar nucleosynthesis. Hydrogen and helium atoms forced together to make the heavier elements, expelled into space when the stars explode.”

Ahes stared at him a moment.

“I don’t know what most of those words mean,” she said. “But from the ones I do know, it sounds as if you have not lost _everything._ ”

“We _do_ do our own science,” Maria told her. “Humans first in all sorts of things and then Honalenier diversified beyond mechanical engineering and physics and simple chemistry. We figured it out ourselves. We can even make our own new elements. They don’t _last_ very long because they’re really unstable, but we can do it without stars.”

Ahes arched an eyebrow at her.

“So you know why iron is so repellant to magic, then?” she asked. “And why, conversely, gold and copper and silver and tin are such good conductors or storage materials for magic?”

“No,” Sebastian admitted. “People have always wondered, but nobody could ever come up with a reason why beyond _‘it just does’_. There didn’t seem to be any intrinsic reason why.”  

“Your understanding of science must be much different than my understanding of science,” Ahes said. “It is very simple. Stars are creation. Stars are _life._ Creation, life- you must have magic. Iron is the last basic material of the universe that a star can create. Once we begin to make iron, we begin to die.”

That was… surprisingly simple. It made a sort of logical sense to Reno, and looking at the others, it seemed they got it too- Maria most of all. Her eyes were wide and shining, full of-

Awe?

Revelation?

Understanding?

 _Well that makes sense,_ came the surprise thought. _Ahes said she had a star. It should be instinctual._

Maria didn’t have a star, though. Maria was the daughter of Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor and Odette von Rothbart ap Gwyn- well, being technical, the Jagdsprinz and _Razanás_ Liechtenstein. But none of them were Ramman, or had anything to do with stars.

But- Maria and space. She’d found the stardust, just lying around under the mountain.

It sounded uncomfortably like scripted destiny to him, and with the memory of his nice pens and the look of enchanted paper and ink under his hands, writing a story to nudge the future into place the way he wanted it to look…

Reno couldn’t dismiss this off-hand, or easily.

 _‘Stars are creation,’_ Ahes’s words echoed from recent memory, and the bottom of his stomach clenched.

Writing was creating too.

“When we fully die,” Ahes continued. “We explode, as was already said. This is a sort of death, but is creation as well. The gases and the dust- the _stardust-_ that comes from this form new things, eventually. New stars. Planets. Comets and meteors and other small astral objects. Life. So these heavier materials are birth out of death, and highly useful in magic.”

“That’s really interesting, _magvhát Razanás_ ,” Reno told her, still looking at Maria. Unease was settling in. “But- could we have a few minutes to talk? By ourselves?”

“Certainly, Princess.”

* * *

They… didn’t really believe her.

Her mother _wanted_ to, at least. She wanted to believe that her daughter had come home, and grown up safe and happy and confident. She’d kept looking at her searchingly, likely trying to find a hint of the little girl she’d left home to rescue.

Lana couldn’t fault her, at least, for not making an instant connection with her grandsons. There was the language barrier, for one- but even as illogical as it was, because it wasn’t like this was exactly the woman who’d seen her grow up and would know her adult face, she was hurt that her mother didn’t just _know_ it was her. _Lana_ would have known her mother anywhere. 

Grandfather hurt more, though. Grandfather was her _Nation-_ the only one she’d ever had. Officially, she’d taken citizenship in Martinach-Liechtenstein after England had collapsed into the Channel Countries rather than letting her English citizenship automatically transfer into the new country, but she’d never really considered herself a _part_ of Martinach-Liechtenstein, or Martinach and the _Großjagdsreich_ after that. Lana Kirkland was _English._

Yes, he wasn’t quite a Nation right now. Yes he, like her mother, hadn’t seen her grow up yet-

But Grandfather had been more than that, too. He’d been her first and primary teacher in the subject of magic; and even after she’d grown into her own power, she’d never lost the first impression she’d had of him when he’d come to get her from Nicnevin’s Court. He’d been powerful there, acting a King in his own right; and a hero, leading her mother there and getting them both back.

“Mum?” Edward asked. It was the only bit of English her sons had learned. “Are you okay?”

She smiled weakly at him.

“Just thinking, Edward.”

She’d just have to come up with a way to convince them she was who she said she was.

* * *

Kiku was concerned.

That was about as specific as he could be about his emotional state at the moment. He was tied up in a miasma of confusion about the entire situation, too much to really be more scared or determined or fatalistic about it than any other emotion.

So- he was concerned.

Norway had snatched England as soon as he’d finished with the conversation he’d been having with some women Kiku didn’t recognize, and convened them off in a corner, away from everyone else, to compare information.

“She’s saying she’s my granddaughter,” England told them about one of the women.

“I didn’t think you had a granddaughter,” Norway said.

England looked a little ashamed.

“I do, actually,” he said. “But she’s _eight._ ”

“Gilbert told us that this is time-travel,” Kiku put in. “I see no reason for her to not have been brought here when she was older-”

“No,” England cut him off. “She’s saying she’s from _this_ time- if we can even trust that! I’m still not convinced this is real.”

“Israel said the year was 27-something,” Norway said. “She _can’t_ be.”

“Why would you think this isn’t real?” Japan asked.

“Because I was going to the Silent Hills when suddenly there was all _this,_ ” England told him, gesturing at the room. “And that’s what _I_ said, Eiliv, but she had answer for that. Something German- _‘Seelenkind’._ From _‘Seelenvolk’_ , I’d assume. She actually used your son as an example.”

 _“Øystein?”_ Norway asked, expression jolting out of neutral.

“The Jäger who found us used that word,” Kiku said.

 _“Jäger?”_ England asked, shocked. “As- not the _Wild Hunt_ Jäger-”

“That’s what they said,” Norway told him. “Not under Jagdsprinz Erlkönig, though. Someone named Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor. I tried to ask who they were, but it didn’t get through the language barrier. _‘Seelenkind’_ was explained as the children of _Razanásan_.”

“That’s not what I heard,” England said.

He paused a moment to look around furtively- that was worrisome- and then dropped his voice.

“She said _Seelenkind_ are _‘full- or half-Nation’_ , which has to be Nation versus human parentage. She said the half-Nation _Seelenkind_ , like your son, get magic and a long, healthy life.”

Kiku saw Norway relax minutely at that; and it occurred to him that his own daughter would count.

He wasn’t sure how he felt about Tomoko having magic, or if he necessarily believed it. She’d never done anything even a little like magic.

 _‘A long, healthy life’_ , though- he wanted her to have that. Magic would be a small trade for keeping her as long as he possibly could.

“And the full-Nation _Seelenkind_ ,” England continued. His voice was almost a whisper now. “She said that, if they’ve used magic, they don’t die at _all._ ”

Norway frowned.

“That’s not how magic works,” he said.

Kiku didn’t practice magic regularly, the way the other two did, but he did know things. Nothing he knew would suggest that magic could do that; and if Norway agreed he wasn’t going to dispute it.

“No, they-” England said. “It’s like Nations. They die, but-”

“ _Humans_ don’t work like that,” Norway cut him off, alarmed.

“From what she said,” England told them. “It didn’t sound like they consider _‘human’_ and _‘Seelenkind’_ to overlap at all.”

“How do they _know?_ ” Kiku asked, perturbed. Logically, there was only way for anyone to know- but he didn’t want it to be true.

“She used János Héderváry as an example. She said he got killed, and came back.”

There was silence for a moment.

“We heard some things about János Héderváry,” Norway told England. “Øystein came over when we were talking to Israel to ask why the one person who found us knew his name. Israel said it was because János Héderváry was their father, and that János had been married to Øystein.”

“Lan- _she_ said that her sons were János’s!” England protested.

Oh no. Israel _hadn’t_ been trying to mess with them.

“Israel also said,” Kiku told him. “That Tomoko married Ásdís Geirsdottir, and that it was all a business arrangement with Øystein and János. The four of them went into business with Cassiel Navin, and then they married their children to each other to take the business from Cassiel, somehow.”

“That’s ludicrous.”

“It’s what Israel told us,” Norway said. “She can be angry and stubborn, but she doesn’t usually lie. And I’ve never known her to lie without cause.”

“You don’t know her that well,” England pointed out.

“Neither do you.”  

“I don’t believe this,” England said firmly. “This is- outlandish and improbable! Time-travel to the far future and humans being magical just because they’re related to Nations and the _Wild Hunt_ not being led by Gwyn ap Llud! He’s _Tylwyth,_ they don’t just _die!_ ”

Norway and Kiku looked at each other.

“The magic isn’t outlandish and improbable,” Norway said after a moment, a hint of reluctance in his voice. “Øystein has magic. It came out when he was young, and I’ve taught him things I know. I even introduced him to the King of the Trolls, soon after we got our countries back.”

“The Jäger said,” Kiku told England. “At least as well as we could tell, that the demon in the House in Martigny killed Jagdsprinz Erlkönig. There is a logical progression from there to a Jagdsprinz titled _‘demon-killer’_.”

England stared at the two of them a moment, then looked around the room, taking in the strangely-uniformed Jäger, the presumably-humans they hadn’t been introduced to, Nations they knew personally who had treated this information as matter-of-fact, and the smattering of others.

“Well,” he said eventually, voice a touch too tight. “I’ve got something that’s _truly_ improbable. _I_ was told that we have some sort of non-aggression treaty with the Pict.”

“We _what?_ ”

* * *

Even before the strangers- or the woman, at least- had started speaking in a slightly-odd Italian, Ludwig hadn’t had a good feeling about this.

It was more than the return of a demon. It was the way that the man had _cat ears_ and a _tail;_ and the way that he couldn’t quite figure out what the woman and France were talking about, even though he knew the language they were speaking in; and the way that the woman had so easily accused Gilbert of not telling him _‘about Honalee or magic or a lot of other awfully important things’_ in nearly the same breath she’d dropped a mention of the Wild Hunt like it was a _real thing;_ and the way that France had reacted to it, like he thought the same.

But mostly, it was the way that he’d been recognized- the woman first mistaking him for someone else, then suddenly coming up with his name.

She’d sounded shocked, apprehensive. She’d said something to the man with the ears that Ludwig was almost certain he’d heard _‘Teutsch’_ in, and then he’d looked alarmed.

They’d seen him and they’d been _scared._

He- if it _was_ as far into the future as they’d claimed, if this was the future at all, then did people still remember the World Wars _that_ strongly?

Ludwig doubted it. As much as he didn’t want people to think of him as _that,_ he also didn’t want them to _forget-_ but he also knew that humans did that.

The analogy Feliciano had used to point out the phenomenon to him was the Crusades. Humans hadn’t forgotten it, but they only knew it was bad in an intellectual sense. Nations were the only ones who had strong emotional reactions to it, because they still had the memories.

He’d even started to see it happen in- in his _‘own’_ time. The World Wars had been a century ago, and people were starting to not care quite so much.

So for these two to have such a strong emotional- _negative_ emotional- association with _‘Deutschland’_ -

What had he _done?_

What had he done- what had his _people_ done- since then?

It only got worse when the woman rounded on France and claimed to be the Vatican’s great-granddaughter. The only people Ludwig had ever heard fluent in Latin like that were the Nations who’d lived in it- and Gianna, who’d learned it conversationally from her father. Surely she could only have gotten so good at it by having learned it as a spoken, living, conversational language in the home environment.

Which meant that this woman was family of his, through Cristoforo, which meant-

Whatever had happened, he hadn’t been able to keep it from touching his family. His family, even if it was by marriage and not necessarily _close_ family, didn’t-

They were scared of him. The Vatican was one of the least hateful and most forgiving people he knew, and _his_ family was scared of him.

Oh _God,_ what had he done?

He was looking at his children, feeling sick to his stomach and desperately hoping that _whatever_ it was, his children had been long dead and hadn’t had to see whatever atrocities he’d committed this second time around and trying to push away the fear that _Cristoforo’s family is scared of you they had to learn that from somewhere it would be from family if Cristoforo wouldn’t talk them out of it then what does **Feliciano** think of you, _when a man walked out of the dining room he and Heinrich had appeared in, closely followed by Gilbert.

It threw him off for a moment, because what his brother was wearing was clearly a dress uniform, but it wasn’t a German Army dress uniform. It didn’t look like _any_ military dress uniform he’d seen. The cut of it was off, though it was mostly recognizable; but the _colors_ were all wrong. Modern dress uniforms, like modern field uniforms, had given up on bright colors in the World Wars, with the exception of the few groups that had maintained historical dress.

This cut was too modern- well, something _like_ modern- to justify the amount of warm azure on the otherwise navy and gray uniform. It made his brother eye-catching, and that was leaving out the gold and silvery-white parts, too numerous to all be rank markings.

The uniform distracted him enough that it took his brother’s stunned _“Ludwig”_ to actually look him in the face.

Ludwig didn’t get very long to see his expression before Gilbert dropped his rifle- Ludwig winced when it hit the ground, that was _not_ safe, what could possibly possess his brother to be careless with _weaponry_ \- and darted forward to grab him.

The hug was vise-like, and Ludwig had to take a couple of seconds to catch up because he hadn’t finished processing the- the-

He didn’t know what, there had been too much going on in his brother’s expression and he didn’t have the context to even begin an attempt to deconstruct it all.

Gilbert was trembling. Ludwig could feel it all down his body, with how close Gilbert was pressed to him and with the tension in his upper body from the strength of his grip around his shoulders, and Ludwig hugged him back.

He had the uncomfortable feeling, as Gilbert’s hold loosened minutely and he leaned into the embrace, that he was the only thing keeping his brother from collapsing to the floor.

“Gilbert?” Ludwig said. “You shouldn’t drop your rifle like that, it’s not safe-”

“They make them real safe these days, Lutz,” his brother told him, oddly breathless. “It’s not going to go off from getting knocked around a bit.”

“You’re _crying,_ ” Ludwig realized, connecting the trembling and the way he was supporting Gilbert’s weight and the odd breathlessness. “Gilbert-”

“It’s just been a long _fucking_ time, Lutz,” his brother said. Ludwig could hear the tears, now. “A _really- shit._ Shit, shit, _shit-_ ”

Gilbert’s voice cracked.

“Brother-”

“ _Goddamn,_ Lutz,” Gilbert said hoarsely. “I never thought I was going to see you again. We’d _lost_ you, we never thought we were going to _see_ you again-”

Ludwig held him a little tighter as the bottom of his stomach dropped out.

They’d _lost_ him. He’d- he hadn’t died, Gilbert would have said he’d died.

They’d _lost him._

Halloween- the dinnertime fight at the UN where he’d tried to break up Russia and America- had only been yesterday. It had only been yesterday that Feliciano had gone half-out of his mind with fear when he’d heard the cold hating uncaring voice Ludwig had dredged up from the memories he was ashamed to have.

Feliciano had begged him to come back, to stay; to not go away inside his own head so deep that _‘Germany’_ was the only thing left.

Feliciano had begged _“please hit me instead”_ and Gilbert had said they’d _lost_ him and these people from the future were _scared_ of him.

Regret was a crushing weight, but it wasn’t anything he hadn’t lived with before. His non-surprise at learning that he wasn’t a good enough person to keep from slipping again, from hurting people from _failing,_ came with a sickeningly bitter sensation in the back of his throat.

 _Of course_ he wasn’t that good of a person. He’d been born in blood and iron and it didn’t matter that he’d managed to shake it off for a century- it would come back to get him. He couldn’t escape it, and none of the words Feliciano or Gilbert had said, about love and trust and family and faith, meant anything about his character even though he’d tried so _hard_ and wanted it so much to be true because apparently he was always, _always_ meant to come back to that point of fear.

 _“We’d,”_ Gilbert had said. Who was that, exactly? Him and Feliciano? His brother, his spouse, _and_ his children?

 _Please not the children,_ Ludwig wished, even as he knew that he’d deserve it, losing his own children. To death or repudiation, it didn’t matter- he’d been the cause of destruction for so many other families, it was only fair.

He opened his mouth to beg forgiveness from his brother, but the Cristoforo’s great-granddaughter spoke before he could.

“ _Ibaam_ Beilschmidt.”

* * *

It was an emotional moment, and Emma _knew_ it was an emotional moment; but they could do that _later._

Somewhere _safer._

“General Beilschmidt,” she said. “Could you _please_ tell them that we’re not trying to trick them into getting killed and convince them to _just leave the building_ with us-”

The General instantly let go of his brother to round on her.

“You don’t just _walk out-_ ”

“We just walked _in!_ ” Emma cut him off, exasperated. For almost a whole two minutes, she’d thought they’d found a solution to this part of their problem, but _no._ “Nico Agresta is holding the demon off out front, if so they just left out the back-”

“I am _not_ putting _my brother_ in the path of a _demon!_ ” the General snarled, and it took Emma an effort of will not to step back.

“It _won’t_ be!” she told him. “We can avoid this _completely_ and get him out-”

It sounded like distant fireworks from here, but Emma knew the sound of gunfire. It was only slightly muffled- so it was coming from inside the building somewhere.

One shot was followed momentarily by another, then another-

The Nations froze only a second before France grabbed Rémy in one hand and Zell in the other and shoved them towards the door of the dining room. Germany was right on his heels with Heinrich and France asked something sharply and the General came back with an answer and _they were going the wrong way._

“Kitchen, downstairs, now!” the General snapped at her, snatching his rifle up from the floor.

“I don’t take my orders from-”

“Leutnantkommandant!” Arik cut her off. “Everyone else is downstairs, we can talk about leaving _there!_ ”

Emma still didn’t like it, but that gunfire from _inside_ the Residence couldn’t be a good sign and if they’d found all the others, it would be better to leave as a group.

Just before she followed the others down the stairs off the dining room, she heard a door slam, somewhere on this floor.

The General, staying behind to cover them, raised his rifle; and Emma closed the door behind them.

* * *

It took some convincing on Feliciano’s part to get Mosè, Luisa, and Marlies to agree to try to leave. Her grandchildren trusted her, but they’d also heard the story of the demon in Martigny all their lives, and weren’t about to be reckless about this situation.

Feliciano approved of the survival instinct, she really did- but the best instinct was always _get out._

She managed it eventually, though, leading Marlies down the hall first towards the staircase at the far end, Luisa and Mosè following behind and then Nia at the rear.

“Wait,” Nia said, just as Feliciano was about to step onto the stairs.

She braced herself for an argument. In hindsight, she wasn’t surprised by Nia saying that if this didn’t work- if anyone got hurt- she was going to hold her accountable, but it still hurt a bit that she felt that it had to be said out loud, immediately upon agreeing to the idea.

“You two were on duty,” Nia said, looking between her niece and nephew, and held her hand out. “Gun, one of you.”

Mosè handed his over after a moment, and Nia turned around and walked back up the long hall, pulling the curtains on the windows open as she went.

“Nia-”

“I’m going to send a message,” Nia cut her off. “And confuse our intentions.”

She got to the end of the hallway and stepped to the wall opposite the last window, raising the gun.

The _bang_ of the first gunshot was immediately followed by the sound of cracking and crumbling glass. Nia walked slowly down the hallway, shooting out each window.

 _Bang._ Shatter. _Bang._ Shatter. _Bang._

“You’re not going to be able to hit the demon from here, _Tante_!” Luisa called in a quiet moment between shots.

 _Bang._ Shatter. _Bang._ Shatter. _Bang._

Nia didn’t replied until she’d gotten to the nearest window.

“I’m not _trying_ to hit it,” she said, and then shot it out.

She handed the gun back to Mosè and stepped up to the window, glass fragments crunching under her boots. She put her hands on the window frame, well away from the broken glass still clinging to the wood, and leaned out a little.

 _“I **see you,** Belial!” _she roared, loud enough to be heard across the lawn. _“I **see you!** I am **coming,** demon! You will **not** be the next Mephistopheles!”_

* * *

Ivan felt all the tension drain out of his shoulders when he heard Nia yell from the broken windows.

The gunshots had been concerning, coming so soon after each other like that. His first thought had been that Emma and Domdruc had found Cassiel Navin, and the not-knowing of the context for them- attack? defense?- had made his gut clench as he tried to convince himself not to think the worst of the situation.

This time, thank God, he hadn’t been proven right.

“She’s not usually that dramatic,” Diana said.

“Ah,” Ivan replied, a smile spreading across his face. “She is _angry,_ Diana. Do you not remember how much better being dramatic makes her feel?”

“It’s been a while, is all,” Diana said. “So what are we going to do? It sounded like she was going to come out here and try taking the demon on herself.”

Unfortunately, Ivan could imagine her doing that. If she was angry enough to be dramatic, she was probably angry enough to come out here and challenge the demon with no protection but righteous fury.

She’d been prepared to do it with Mephistopheles, after all.

He looked around the road at the gathered Jäger.

“We need to clear this out,” he said. “If Nia is going to provoke the demon, there will be a fight. There is no use having the Department Jäger here, nor the less-experienced of the Regiments. We must have room to maneuver, and I do not wish to have anyone we do not know have already been tried in serious combat.”

“I’m not leaving my husband,” Diana told him.

Well, he’d expected that.

“You are High Command,” he said. “And I know. It will do no good trying to convince Odette or Ravenna or Isolde and the others or your parents-in-law to leave, either. Will you at least get them to move further away?”

Diana agreed to try, and Ivan crossed his arms, considering who he wanted to stay.

Lord Hiruz, definitely; and Boreas and the Kascheiyivna sisters. They had all faced a demon before. Diana hadn’t, but she wouldn’t leave and she _had_ been on the Camorra purges, and came from a Camorra family before that. She wouldn’t run, or fall apart.

The rest of High Command could go. The only people from it he would have wanted they’d lost to the Residence already.

He called Leontiy Yurivitch and Mäelle Beilschmidt over to start coordinating people to leave. General Yurivitch agreed with him, as his commanding officer; but Mäelle tried to argue.

“You are very good at your job, Generalleutnant,” he cut her off, after letting her vent her worry about Arik and Marlies and Emma. “But your job is not fighting demons. Intelligence and Internal Affairs is currently without an acting General, so go back to Martigny and make certain it is still functioning. You are the _only_ one who can fill in for Arik. Do your duty.”

 He meant it, and Mäelle knew better than to try to argue with an order like that.

“Leontiy,” Ivan said, as Mäelle went off, still in a bit of a bad mood, to get people moving back to their assigned posts across the galaxy. “I want you to send Generalleutnant Ruǎn here when you get back to Martigny.”

Huīhéng had been in the Hunt against Mephistopheles, and come back to join the Hunt as part of the later Honalenier contingent, those who had waited to see if Nia was actually up to the job.

For a few moments, Ivan watched as the Jäger started to organize themselves. Diana had moved the non-Jäger they wouldn’t be able to convince to leave back, and had started helping Leontiy and Mäelle get people ready to leave Kharad.

“Ilya,” he said to his AI as he started circulating around the Jäger, pulling the veterans he wanted to stay out of the groups getting ready to leave. The media cordon was going to be short-staffed, but-

“Marschall Braginski.”

He stopped and looked over. Hengda Liukasiewicz was standing there, looking defiant.

“Yes?”

“The Kharad NCO Auxiliary isn’t leaving,” he said. “There’s really only the three of us, because I wouldn’t bring my Sorcery Officer out here except as absolutely the last option, but this is also our city. You’ll need help.”

“We are expecting the Jagdsprinz to do something foolish,” Ivan told him. “It would be better for you if you were not here.”

“If you’re that worried, then send Damir and I back to the precinct,” he said. “But don’t send Zannah away.”

Ivan gave him a long look. He’d been on Enceladus for that particular kill. As soon as they’d gotten wind of what was going on, the Jagdsprinz had pulled the best and most experienced of the Jäger, just in case.

“She agreed to not use her knowledge.”

“In the service of the Hunt?” he asked stubbornly. “The only other people you have who know anything about demons are the Vatican and Israel, and they’re in there somewhere. Zannah never applied it practically, but she _knows_ everything Olivia Haynes put together. It’s more than you’ll have otherwise.”

“Are you volunteering her?” Ivan asked him. “Or has she offered?”

“She hasn’t offered,” Hengda told him. “But she won’t refuse.”

Ivan looked back towards where Diana had moved Odette and the others. Zannah Brahe and Damir Beilschmidt were huddled close together, having a conversation.

Then he looked back at the thinning media cordon.

“Very well,” he told Hengda. “Take your husband and go to nearest precinct. Tell the precinct major that he has been called by the Hunt. You can keep the media back, and make sure they _leave_ when things become dangerous. I will keep Zannah.”

“You wanted something?” Ilya asked him as Hengda went off to his husband.

“I want Adalram, Siegrike, Merric, Cauac, Dariya, Magda Eisenhart, Vasco Agresta, and Nantakash Harshaisha,” he told the AI, leaving the assembling Jäger to inform Demyanev that he was being given a temporary loan. “For the others- the best of those from the Hunt called on Mephistopheles, or who took an active role in the Italian Civil War, or who survived the _Distawydwr._ Give me a list of who you think would work.”

Zannah met him over by Demyanev, looking a bit apprehensive. Demyanev was eyeing her, trying to be subtle about it but failing.

 “Generalleutnant Demyanev,” Ivan said. “The Kharad NCO Auxiliary is seconding you Inspector Brahe for the duration of this situation, given her specialized knowledge.”

Demyanev stopped trying to be subtle and just gave Zannah a wary look.

“I was there for Olivia Haynes,” he told her. His tone had a bit of a warning in it.

“I know,” Zannah said. “I remember. I won’t break the Pact.”

* * *

The only reason there hadn’t been a massive uproar when Emma and Domdruc appeared with Zell, Rémy, Heinrich, France, and _Germany_ was because no one wanted to have to explain _why_ the uproar had happened in the first place to any of the time-travelers right then.

It helped that there was the pressing matter of the reported gunshots to consider.

János had added himself to the group of Jäger that had formed to talk their way to a plan of action- Arik, Árpád, Emma and Domdruc- on the basis that he was _Seelenkind_ and family to Nia and Nico, and they were under discussion.

Emma and Domdruc had hastily summarized the High Command meeting about the disappearances, the Hunt decamping to Kharad, the appearance of South Italy and Spain, Nico’s demon distraction, and were working on the story of getting into the Residence and finding the group when the General returned to the room.

“The shooting was up on the fourth floor, in the bedrooms,” he announced as he walked in. “Apparently there were some suspicious-looking people up there, and _they_ were trying to get away-”

Objectively, János realized that the presence of Germany was going to, likely very very soon, cause an upset in international politics and some touchy personal relations that he might just go the Steppes and Lanka Kubera to avoid, but _this-_

“ _Mama_!” he exclaimed, reaching for her. _“ **Apa!** ”_

Briefly, as he threw himself into the hug, he saw his mother’s expression go shocked.

“What on _Earth_ ,” she said as she hugged him back. His father shifted uncomfortably in the group hug János had pulled them all into; and János couldn’t help smiling. _Apa_ hadn’t ever been much for hugs. _“ **Jansci-”**_

He’d closed his eyes, going into the hug, to better feel the touch and to keep some stray tears at bay.

He opened them and saw Cassiel Navin.

János froze for a split second, mind spitting static. That was long enough to take in a few details- the Jäger were outright staring at him in consternation; but he was ignoring them, looking around at everything with that vague sort of inquisitive interest he’d had for as long as János had worked with him, the same unthinking entitlement to information and knowledge that had led him to hide Árpád away in Hungary.

And Gianna was clinging to his arm, eyes darting around the room, noting the people she knew. She relaxed, slowly; and then brightened up as Cristoforo bustled over, arms open to embrace her.

So- Giovanna and his parents, more time-travel then; but that didn’t mean he was about to let _Cassiel Navin_ anywhere near his family if he could help it, no matter what he hadn’t gotten up to yet.

He drew back from the hug and pulled his parents across the room, his father making a little noise of indignation at being manhandled and Árpád sticking close behind them, looking a little disturbed.

 _“János,”_ his mother said when they stopped. She was staring at him.

He hugged her again.

“It’s _so_ good to see you again, _Mama._ ”

“What are you _wearing?_ ” his father asked, picking at the floral embroidery done in bright blues and greens and white and gold and silver on the edges of his overcoat.

His mother pushed him away, gently, so that János had to take a step back. She looked him up and down- the dark green knee-length robe of Gerekh Narsni, the soft leather boots and the full pants tucked into their tops, the formal russet overcoat with the decorations-

Her eyes stopped on his black sash-belt, stiff with silver embroidery; and the look on her face told him she knew exactly what it meant.   

“How?” she asked quietly. “Why?”

“It’s a long story you won’t like,” János told her, unable to keep his eyes from flicking over to his father. Austria was looking between them, trying to puzzle out what they were talking about.

Hungary took a deep breath and reached over to take one of her husband’s hands.

“Roderich,” she said. “Our son has been in Honalee.”

“You’ve _what?_ ” his father said to him, aghast.

“I’m a sorcerer,” János told his parents. “I’ve been to the Four Cities of the Tylwyth Teg and the Five Cities of Chicomoztoc, to Póli Thálassas, to Buyan-on-Kitzeh, to Takama-ga-hara, to Ordon Khot and Lanka Kubera, to Hawaiki and Avalon and Morningtown and Nysa and Orcus and even up to the gates of Irkalla. I was trained as a sündeyalacgh-”

He touched his belt.

“-by Cherendai Eshanaraj Khüragni nomrynsaaralüüls gerekh narsni Temurev, a sorcerer and sündeyalacgh as well. Through her I was accepted as a family-friend of Gerekh Narsni, and I’m legally allowed _‘János Béla Héderváry-Edelstein khörsh gerekh narsni Cherendev’_. I’ve had teachers from just about every tradition of magic in Honalee, and I’ve spent most of my life traveling the galaxy, learning from other people and teaching them what I know-”

“The ‘ _galaxy’?_ ”

“This isn’t Earth,” János said. “This is space. It’s 2746.”

“It _can’t_ be,” his mother said. “You’re alive.”

He forced a smile. It probably wouldn’t help, but…

“I don’t die, _Mama,_ ” János told her. “Not like humans. I come back, like Nations.”

* * *

Maria had thought she’d learned everything she needed to about the universe through math, the basics of magic she’d been taught, and what the edge of creation had sung to her about borders and twilight-edges, when she’d touched it.

But this-

The explanation of stars and iron and gold slotted into a part of her she hadn’t realized existed before. It had done so with a little mental _clik,_ a re-alignment of something inside her that she’d never known had been off, but now-

Reno and Sebastian and Nadri were staring at her.

“Did you hear what she said?” she asked. “4,560 Arduhadene of work. Research and theory. _4.56 **billion years**_ of information about magic and the mechanics and metaphysics of the universe-”

She needed it. She _needed_ it she had to _know-_

“-and the Erlkönig just- let it get _destroyed!_ All the _things_ we’ve lost; all the things we could have _known-”_

“Now isn’t the time to get sad about science,” Nadri told her.

“I’m not _sad,_ ” Maria said. “I-”

She didn’t know the words.

 _“Sebastian,”_ she said, not quite pleading but not quite addressing. Her brother had always been good at the vague sort of mental and emotional things, the ones that couldn’t be easily expressed.

This time was no different. He unfolded from his seat on the ground and crawled the short distance between them. Reno shifted out of the way and her brother took his seat, next to her, and she pushed up against him, resting her forehead on his shoulder while he hugged her.

“What?” he asked.

“What she _said,_ ” Maria told him. “She said and I don’t _know_ but I _have_ to _know._ ”

Her awareness of herself had changed, and she couldn’t change it back, but she didn’t know where to go from here just that she _had_ to keep going.

“Why are we trusting her?” Nadri asked, glancing over to Ahes. She’d moved away some feet, out of earshot, and was looking at the buildings again. “She’s a witch.”

“She said she’s not one yet,” Reno said, while Maria tried to remember that she had to breathe. She kept stopping on the exhale, and not noticing. “And she hasn’t been acting witch-like, or done anything illegal.”

“People always say that Cassiel Navin didn’t look like he was doing anything wrong until everyone found out he was,” Nadri reminded him. “And even nobody found out _Papà_ until things had started falling apart. You don’t know things are bad until it’s obvious.”

“She saved us.”

“We should take her to the Hunt.”

“If she is lying,” Sebastian spoke up. “She won’t agree to go to the Hunt. If she’s not, it would be rude to make it so obvious that we don’t trust her.”

“So then we’re rude,” Nadri said.

“She’s one of the old Kings,” Reno said. “One of _the_ oldest. She’s also _literally_ the Sun. We shouldn’t be rude to her. You aren’t rude to the _other_ Kings.”

“The other Kings aren’t witches.”

“If we brought _Elti_ here,” Sebastian said. “That’s not really rude. And it’s not bringing the Hunt, not _really._ ”

Nadri gave him a one-sided shrug.

“Not your _Elti,_ though,” she said. “The _Jagdsprinz._ Just in case. She’s the _Sorcerer-_ Queen of Kêr-Is.”

“There’s a demon to deal with, though,” Maria said, not raising her head.

“And an out-of-time condemned King of Honalee isn’t about as important?” Nadri asked. “Anyway- Leutnantkommandant Miccichelo has definitely called the Hunt out now, so they’ll be looking for _us._ There’s no reason for them to think there’s a demon. We might be giving her important information the Hunt wouldn’t have otherwise learned about until it was too late.”

“We don’t have to,” Reno told her. “And it’s your decision, anyway. The Shining City is your place, not ours. I know you’ve been keeping it a secret.”

Maria took a few moments to think about it.

Nadri had some of a point. They should know if Ahes was lying to them or not- at least about the not doing witchcraft yet, she was certain Ahes wasn’t lying about the stars. And even if she _wasn’t_ lying, this was probably more of a thing for the Jagdsprinz than just her _Elti,_ at least initially. Her _Elti_ would definitely care, too, but that could come after the Jagdsprinz’s judgement of the situation.

But she had to know _more._

“You’re sure about that, Nadri?” she asked, turning her head so she could see him. “The Jagdsprinz specifically?”

“It’s a good idea,” she maintained.

It was.

“All right,” Maria said. “ _Elti_ would have to know about here at some point.”

She held out her arm.

“Nadri, could you-”

Nadri looked at Maria’s arm, then deliberately dug her claws into her own forearm, in roughly the same place she’d been digging in before. Reno winced and made a little noise of disapproval.

“You can heal it in a second,” Nadri told him. “Maria needs blood for this.”

She offered her wounded forearm, and Maria drew the Jagdsprinz’s glyph-name on the stone of the street in her blood. They could make do with a stripped-down version of the summoning spell- they were _Elti_ ’s family.

She held her hand open flat, a few centimeters over the glyph.

“In the name of Ereshkigal Queen of Irkalla,” Maria recited. “Ruler of the Dead, Maker of Kings, I summon you Jagdsprinz Lord of the Wild Hunt, Protector and Enforcer, First Among Kings, to bring judgement as is your duty and a responsibility of your office.”

She touched the glyph.

* * *

The ambient magic of the universe _jerked_ and buckled under a sudden pressure. Across the galaxy, Earth-side and Honalee-side, sorcerers and fey and fey-blooded to gag, or clutch their heads, or curl up until they stopped trembling.

Little magics, the personal protection and luck charms and the like, collapsed completely.

The same upheaval caused set spells, like the magical components of the consumer goods companies like the dissolved HabéTech sold, to waver.

Telecommunications and network connections screeched in static and feedback and coding errors as the galaxy’s AIs twisted in on themselves in response to a raking, pulling pressure through their immaterial beings. The power grids and traffic control networks and other infrastructural systems cut out under the stress and onslaught. The galaxy went dark for a few long seconds; and then everything started to reboot, automatic network diagnostics running and finding nothing, flashing error alerts. Technicians tried to raise the planetary AIs, but they stayed silent.

The tow-beacon connectors in the starship engines faltered, then failed. Momentum kept them traveling but without operational tow-beacons on the lightspeed paths to tug them in the proper, carefully-calculated trajectories, ships shot out into dead space at trillions of meters per second, decelerating and getting pushed even more off-course as they went.

In the Imperial Human State, in the International Republican Confederacy, on the planets of the Independent Powers, the _Großjagdsreich_ included, young Nations, Nations who had never been to war, not _properly,_ who had lived in safety and comfort and security for their centuries of life, died screaming in meetings and in their offices and at work and at home and out shopping.

On Helike, in the Imperial Residence complex, Intelligence officers tore their earpieces out as Don went down in an ear-splitting cacophony of screechy, incomprehensible digital tones, flooding the local computer networks with junk code and digital flailing, crashing everything.

Elsewhere in the building, Forouzandeh had choked with the force of trying to hold in her own screams.

On Earth, Yao, like many of the other old Nations, left bloody furrows through his own hair as he clutched at an overwhelming pressure in his skull, in his soul, and bashed his head in against a wall.

In Kharad, Ivan shoved the barrel of his handgun into the soft join of neck and jaw, angled up, and pulled the trigger through his tears of pain to a mental litany of _stop stop stop **stop-**_

 Around him, Jäger stood stunned, or sat down hard, at the sudden, full-body blow of the latent sense of _Hunt_ they all had being ripped away, leaving an empty space inside; a piece of their souls torn away that, once it had been added, was never really meant to leave, especially not violently.

Lord Hiruz sank to his knees, head pressed to the ground, eyes closed and ears back, trembling, trying to wait it out.

Nico jerked out of the mindless focus he’d been holding against the demon and tried to move, but got only managed to shift his weight enough to topple him over when he exhaled, and then failed to take another breath.

The Nations and Jäger in the kitchen of the Governor’s Residence weren’t spared by their position. Øystein and Tomoko watched their parents die in front of them, and the kitchen staff tried to shake the Jäger out of their daze, and Zell tried to catch Heinrich as he fell and started crying, begging, when she realized he wasn’t breathing any longer and he wasn’t the only one- Cassiel and Giovanna, János and Árpád-

In Honalee, Kings dropped, not dead but unconscious- Nicnevin in front of her Court, Xī Wángmŭ in her personal quarters where she was trying to reassure her daughter and son-in-law that Marlies would be found safe and sound, Kaschei Perun as he walked down a hallway; Amphitrite and Kore and Arion far away in the kitchen, unnoticed in the chaos there-

Nia fell, losing her grip on the handrail of a staircase Mosè, Luisa, and Feliciano had already descended, and tumbled down a flight of stairs connecting the first and second floors of the Governor’s Residence.

The foundations of Irkalla trembled in time with every bang against a step, and Ereshkigal herself stumbled when Nia hit the floor at the bottom.

* * *

“I don’t think it worked,” Maria said, frowning slightly. “That should have worked.”


	8. Perfect Balance

János was sündeyalacgh, and had died before.

Neither of those things were like this.

With spirit walking, with doing a sündeyalacgh’s work, it was controlled. You couldn’t leave your body unless you wanted to.

With dying- he was less clear on that. He’d gone to talk to the old Nations after his first time, to see what they had to say about it, and the answer was always the same. It was like passing out. You died, nothing, you stopped being dead.

The memory he had of it wasn’t much. It was more a vague sort of feeling, a moment of _too much_ fogged over because the brain was not designed to handle interpretation of the outside world that hadn’t been done by itself, the brain was not designed to handle the moment of just _magic_ of that moment when your soul refused to die.

But János was sündeyalacgh, and had died before, and knew the feel of death around him. His body had inexplicably failed, but that was only one-fifth of his soul no matter the rest wasn’t refusing to die this time because here, in this shadow-spirit place that felt like the usual magical side of the physical world but _wasn’t,_ the deaths of the Nations were fire-flashes in the silvery-white-grey fog tremors in the black ground in his bones and the half-Nation _Seelenkind_ ’s candle flames guttered as whatever happened _happened_ but the human in them held them down and casting dim diffuse light in the fog and _no_

Heinrich Beilschmidt could not die. Giovanna Pietri could not die. Cassiel Navin could not die.

The full-Nation _Seelenkind_ could _not_ die; they could not destroy the timeline and put the universe to tearing itself apart as the tension of effect-cause-effect-cause-past-future-will-be-has-been- _continuity_ snapped and rebounded across everything.

János didn’t know if it was magic metaphor local reality witchcraft sorcery sündeyalacgh-work but he caught the fire-flashes of death up in his hand in an open sweep of his arm and _slammed_ them into his cousins.

Germany and Norway for Heinrich, family and mythology. Israel and the Vatican for Giovanna, God and faith. Prussia and Japan for Cassiel, survival and exponential progress.

The fog was retreating he was sliding back away it was warm black it was the cliff-edge full-Nation _Seelenkind_ stepped off and flew from never came down from when they chose magic not human but János had come down pulled down was going down the cliff-edge was sneaking up on his back.

He was holding the fire-flashes of Hungary and Austria’s deaths, ancestral power and sacrifice-for-revelation but

_Árpád Héderváry **would not be allowed** todie_

János shot his hand forward to slam the fire into his eldest child, an equal and opposite reaction that would send him over the cliff-edge-

Their open palms slammed together as Árpád met his hand. The jolt of impact overbalanced him just the slightest bit backwards but a quick twist and a reach and Árpád had grabbed his wrist and leaned back and they were a balancing act on the edge of the cliff, János feeling the empty air at his back and the hard press of a dull angle in the insteps of his feet.

“Árpád-”

“You can’t leave, _Apa_ ,” his eldest told him calmly. “We’re sharing.”

János took a breath.

He’d never been here before, but-

Cherendai Temurev had taught him. They’d both ended up sündeyalacgh and sorcerer but he’d been a sorcerer first while she’d been a sündeyalacgh first, and the things she’d taught him about both

_He was living with Nomrynsaaralüüls Gerekh Narsni while Cherendai taught him. Gerekh Narsni was on their way from the summer trade at Ordon Khot to the winter grounds. A young woman had given birth and was bleeding to death. Usually, this wouldn’t be a problem, because each gerekh had its share of permanent doctors- but their particular group had kept the old, experienced one with them, just in case of something like this, and he had died suddenly the night before. The young woman was his student. The accumulated knowledge of the others in the gerekh who had helped before with dangerous births, or had one themselves, or lost a relative to one, hadn’t been able to come up with a solution to keep her alive yet. A rider had been sent out to the nearest group to get their doctor, but it was half a day’s ride at caravan-pace ahead of them._

_“We are not doctors,” Cherendai told him, once they were told that the woman wouldn’t stop bleeding. She’d brought him to her bedside, and he wasn’t really sure why. “We cannot heal the body, or even the mind like kümecgh. But sündeyalacgh know **souls.** We cannot heal her, but we can keep her from dying. The body may fail, but so long as the rest of the parts of the soul are still present, and the life-force has not been broken, the doctors can fix the rest.”_

_Nausea rolled in János’s stomach. He remembered Svana, rotting but moving, on the floor of Cassiel’s workshop._

_“Draugr-”_

_“No,” Cherendai cut him off. Her eyes went sharp. “It is witchcraft once the life-force has broken, once that connection between body and rest has failed. **That** cannot be replaced. **She** is still alive. You would be sündeyalacgh? You must know the soul.”_

_She dropped into her seat._

_“Watch me,” she commanded, and János followed her on the breath out to see what she did as her shadow-soul self._

_“You anchor life in life,” Cherendai began, once he arrived. “There are five parts of the soul. Five directions. Five sections of the year. Five base colors. Five elements. Five fundamental materials. We will anchor her in her family, around us._

_First. Life-force. East. Agni Devpada. Red. Fire. Flint.”_

János started to breathe out.

Árpád, his first child, his eldest, the true start of his life as _Seelenkind,_ as sorcerer. He always came back to Árpád, and Árpád to him. Árpád was his tie to Honalee, his commitment, the one who was physically holding him to life, in this moment.

Flint anchor, set.

_“Second. Shadow. North. Kerzna Kempada. Yellow. Earth. Bronze.”_

Kore Despoina with her gardens and her traditional gifts, the grain and the fruit and the vegetables. The wide fields of Orcus, the rolling hills and the towering easternly and westernly cliffs. The Kings hadn’t died- they were subdued, weak, but not dead.

Bronze anchor, set.

Weaker than he’d like it to be, but set.

_“Third. Body. West. Prak-Rudrazan. Black. Stone. Iron.”_

Lana, a practitioner almost to match him and a theorist to surpass him, half-Tylwyth quarter-Nationquarter-human. Another functional immortal, the mother of his human sons. Original-class Witchbreaker, who had done her duty with the Jagdsprinz’s fury behind her.

Iron anchor, set.

Her soul was warm and strong through it, even suppressed as her magic was by the demon.

_“Fourth. Mind. South. Kerzna Devpada. Blue. Water. Silver.”_

Edward, who valued his mind so much, who lived on his cleverness and his track record of solving difficult problems, tricky situations.

Silver anchor, set.

_“Fifth. Soul-essence. Up-under. Agni Kempada. White. Lightning. Gold.”_

Joseph, the artist. As much as Honalee had a story of the creation of life, the answer was lightning. Creation, scathing heat and energy in the skies. Joseph and his photographs and his poems.

Gold anchor, se-

A fire-flash and Joseph slipped away from him, a human death. János’s final anchor failed to ground and stopped exhaling for a moment, trying to keep his balance.

_Jose-_

A second fire-flash and the iron anchor melted away, the silver anchor trembled, and János’s feet started to slip.

Árpád tightened their grip and dug their heels in, leaning back more, and János realized that he hadn’t gripped back.

“Full-Nation from you, _Apa_ ,” they said, as János corrected that, fingers closing around his eldest’s wrist in return. “Something like _Razanás_ from Mother. Born _túdos pásztor_ and made Jäger, Witchbreaker. I _will not_ let you go.”

 _“Lana,”_ János gasped. “Joseph-”

“I can hold you,” Árpád told him, but they weren’t sündeyalacgh and János was and the bronze anchor was weak and silver had stabilized but he needed iron, he needed gold-

Árpád started to hum a complicated rhythm, tapping out a complimentary pattern on the side of their leg, some sort of binding maybe that they hoped would work here, and János scrabbled for replacement someones to anchor in.

Gold- lightning electricity creation new life he was thinking of the AIs what Cherendai had taught him he’d extrapolated to create them new life new life change creation electricity change creation technology _no not Cassiel Navin_ lightning lightning lightning static electricity on cold dry days cold dry days cold dry something something something _Lana no why how_ cold looks dry looks electricity change new life he had something he had something he had an affinity he had someone in mind who was it dry looks change new life electricity creation technology new life not AIs new life

Øystein Brynjarssonfirst spouse ex-husband start of new life twice over once leaving home leaving humanity finding magic once leaving company leaving security starting to wander.

_Gold anchor, set._

Iron- iron was black was stone he was thinking of gold still why was he thinking of gold gold gold and iron gold and black gold black red iron and steel gold iron blood earth stone rowan grove with a stone _‘With this pact of blood and iron sealed in gold we are as one people sovereign and eternal’_ the words of the Irvinrdisganheid the Domdruc Jägerskov iron was always always for the Hunt you could take the gold you could take the red blood but you couldn’t take the black iron always iron for the Hunt _where’s Nia when you actually need her to be violently angry and protect something Verity Joseph Lana please please please not Edward too_ other Jäger Árpád here Arik was unicorn Arik had dragon Arik was Pict non-magic fire air maybe water maybe not Honalee doesn’t matter Arik not right Emma fire lightning fast powerful death steel yes almost but not iron he’d seen her fight and seen her kill that High King’s May Day on Algarth

Domdruc Filfaraskind Jäger _Drakräder_ fighting _Distawydwr_ with long iron knives iron knuckledusters huldrene kodrene Irvindisganheid to his core there was iron his bones that’s what you got being the Jagdsprinz’s people.

_Iron anchor, set._

János finished breathing out. His tightened his grip on Árpád’s wrist, to the point where he was probably cutting off some circulation, but he needed all the support he could find, after feeling the deaths and the anchors come loose like that, and with the empty air and nothing to catch him behind and below.

“ _Apa_ ,” Árpád said. “What happened?”

* * *

He’d been holding it together.

He hadn’t wanted too and he’d almost felt like he couldn’t but he’d done this his whole life, pretending; and he could continue pretending until he could slip away and _out_ of here.

He’d been prepared to lie through his teeth and it had been a stroke of luck, the only one he’d had in-

In-

He didn’t know how long. No one ever came to talk to him and the sun rose and set but there was only so long you could count that and he hadn’t even managed to get past-

He couldn’t remember when he’d stopped being able to trust his own mind to count the days passing because he was dying of dehydration and he’d always heard three days as being the longest you could go without water but it definitely took longer than that or maybe he was imaging that maybe he was imaging this _no no no_ he couldn’t think like that it definitely took longer than three days and he’d learned that it was even worse when it rained because then he’d be wet and you cooled off too much when it evaporated and if it was an evening rain then the temperature dropped and if it was windy _God_ how he _hated_ thunderstorms even frost or snow was better freezing to death was faster

Finding Giovanna first had been the only luck he’d had in too long, even when she’d hugged him. He’d been able to handle the talking, just barely; but he’d almost lost it then because he was used to noise but touching _why did she have to **touch him**_ and he’d only been able to hold it off because he’d bitten the inside of his cheek and bled and that little bit of available magic was enough he wouldn’t use it he’d done that once already and didn’t want to damage his body any more not after so much time dying dying dying but just _feeling_ it was reassurance, and he’d reminded himself that if Giovanna was here then that meant _time-travel_ and this no-magic meant _demon_ and that meant the Hunt was coming.

He couldn’t let the Hunt get him, not again.

He _couldn’t_ go back he _wouldn’t_ go back-

He’d made it through Hungary and Austria and even finding Venice and the Jagdsprinz on the floor above the study where they’d met the two Nations though that had been on threads and then Prussia fine he could deal with Prussia but then they’d been shoved in a safe room and _the Jäger had seen him._

Two of the Jäger he didn’t know but

Arik. János’s other child. Lana Walker-Kirkland. And János had dragged his parents away and the other Jäger had been _looking_ at him and Arik and János’s one and England’s granddaughter had been in the group that had gotten him the _first_ time and they didn’t have magic here but once they left they would and

He’d been trying to cling to the fact that he’d been pulling magic from the technology but he could feel that Øystein and Norway had done it too and by the wall behind the Jäger was some sort of cloth roll or bag and he could feel magic in it a _lot_ of magic and he’d been trying to figure out some way to get to it when he started to die.

It wasn’t like the deaths he’d gotten used to. This felt like _true_ death and it was without enough magic to bring him back and the Nations were dying too and he’d flailed out with the little magic he’d already collected, trying to grab the big source of magic in the cloth thing by the wall but he’d snagged something else instead, something bigger, the power released by the death of the one of the Nations he thought it was England but at the same time that he grabbed _that_ something else _someone_ else

He knew it was János but he didn’t know _how_ he knew it was János

Was _right there_ and then there was a _surge_ of magic and he hadn’t really used anything of England’s death but he was stable again, and Giovanna was shaking on the floor and Zell was trying to hold Heinrich down and cursing the absence of Cato and her medical training through the tears and _János Héderváry had been there in death and they’d figured it out_

The Jäger _knew_ he’d been lying and they’d tried something why they’d had János do it he didn’t know but his other child had done the binding when the Witchbreakers had come to drag him off and so why shouldn’t he be able to do something similar and he didn’t know _what_ János had come up with but this whole thing was a trick whatever they’d tried had been enough to flatten half the others in the room and it _hadn’t worked_ but it had _almost_ worked and _he had been about to die_

The Hunt had almost figured out how to kill _Seelenkind_ and they’d dragged him out of Tartarus to this strange no-magic place to _kill him_

He couldn’t die he couldn’t die he _couldn’t die_ he’d been dying for too long that’s all he’d been doing for so long and he couldn’t let them kill him _permanently_ he was going to get away _he had to get away_

He was taking apart the cloth roll or bag, searching for the big magic source, before he was really thinking about anything. It was too close to where one of the Jäger he didn’t know, one with nasty fighting knives, was lying stunned on the ground he had to find it _fast_ before any of them could react

It was a jar, filled with some thick sparkly glowy off-white stuff- he’d never done it himself but this matched the descriptions of condensed magic he’d heard.

Someone knelt down beside him and he clutched the jar tighter it fit nicely into his hands it was about soup can size and once his heart stopped racing quite so much and he could breathe right again and lie again like he was so good at he could convince his hands to unclench and unscrew the lid-

The man next to him said something. He didn’t know the language. The man repeated himself.

A voice he knew, that was Lana Walker-Kirkland, called shakily to the man. He turned his head and said _“Mum”_.

There were some things after that but it was in the language again but he knew _that_ much that was English this was Lana’s _son-_

Something else and the man glanced back at him; then looked away again to some other man kneeling on the floor halfway across the room over where János and his other child had fallen and the man next to him said something something something _“Apa”_ and _he knew that word too._

This man next to him was Lana and János’s son and Lana had come for him as part of the Witchbreakers it had had János’s other one with them and Lana János they were _Seelenkind_ like him this man would be _Seelenkind_ and he was back to looking at him and he glanced down at the jar of magic and moved his hand and

In the haze of terrified paranoid panic he’d been trying to suppress since suddenly being released from six hundred and fifty-seven years of solitary confinement and countless slow deaths in Tartarus, Cassiel Navin smashed the heavy glass jar of magic Emma Miccichelo had brought to give the sorcerers trapped in the Governor’s Residence into the side of Joseph Kirkland-Héderváry’s head, grabbed Domdruc Filfaraskind’s longest _Dräkrader_ knife, and thrust the two feet of iron through Joseph’s neck, killing him.

* * *

Lana had never thought there could be something like- like a magical _earthquake,_ but that was the best way she could describe what she’d just lived through. She’d felt the shudder all through her body, and the feeling after was something sort of like your foot not meeting the ground where you expected it to.

She was still in the midst of that uncertain, adjusting moment to things just being… not _right,_ and distracted by the way the Nations had just _died_ and János had keeled over when the other full-Nation _Seelenkind_ and Árpád had but the two of them hadn’t gotten _up_ when Cassiel Navin completely lost his self-control and murdered her son.

Dead bodies weren’t really anything new to her. They were uncommon but she’d _seen_ them before, but-

Lana had never seen someone _killed_ before. Not in person. And not someone in her family.

Not her _son._

Verity’s death hadn’t even been a week ago and now _Joseph-_

Her first instinct was to reach for her magic and she was most of the way through it before she remembered that there _wasn’t_ any here and by that point it was too late.

She’d broken bones before and this wasn’t like that. The bones in her left leg just _disintegrated_ and she would have crashed into the floor if her mother hadn’t caught her.

That misstep cost. Lana had only a handful of magic from accidentally destroying part of her own skeleton, but it was enough to feel as Cassiel pulled more magic from Joseph’s murder and the jar he’d been holding and then fling part of it out, doing something with it she couldn’t catch because she could feel the _movement_ of magic fine, but she wasn’t like János and some others she knew, who’d learned to tell what directed magic was _doing_ just by the feel of it.

More death followed it, though- the Residence staff they’d taken in.

How many of them had there been, she couldn’t exactly remember but maybe about ten and about ten plus Joseph-

There was a lot of power to be had from a death.

Lana tried to push her mother away.

“No, _go,_ ” she pleaded desperately. “ _Mum,_ get out of here before-”

“No,” her mother said and she _couldn’t_ say that she had to leave; where was Cassiel Navin she couldn’t _see_ him from this angle and with her mother right here.

“Mum _please,_ ” Lana said. “He just killed Joseph I can’t lose _all_ of my sons take Edward and _go-_ ”

She saw Cassiel Navin loom up behind her mother and the one thing Lana knew about Cassiel Navin was that he didn’t really _care_ about other people, they were set dressing for him, he probably wouldn’t even _consider_ what it would do to the universe if he went through her mother to get to her- so she used her handful of magic and shoved her mother a full seven meters across the tile floor of the kitchen, safely out of the way.

Where the _Hell_ were the Jäger-

Lana caught of a glimpse of them past Cassiel’s legs. It looked like they’d been hit harder by whatever-had-happened than she had- Emma had only just picked herself up, and was staring at Joseph’s body and the broken glass of the jar, comprehension slow to come. Domdruc Filfaraskind was flat on his back, looking blank-eyed up at the ceiling; and Arik had physically curled up on himself on the floor.

They weren’t going to be any help and she wasn’t going to be able to get anywhere fast and the only other person _alive_ and _conscious_ right now whose death wouldn’t destroy the universe was Edward and Lana was _not_ going to let her son get between her and Cassiel Navin.

Children were not allowed to die for their parents.

Lana looked Cassiel Navin right in the eye and tried to come up with a plan in the seconds she had before he took that stolen _Drakräder_ knife to her. It was pure iron, not necessarily the best metal for a weapon but it meant she wouldn’t be able to target it with any more magic she pulled from herself and there was no point trying to get Cassiel because he had exponentially more magic than she did right now and she remembered the way he’d deflected magical attacks when the Witchbreakers had come for him the first time-

She’d realized she had no offensive options and not really any defensive ones when Giovanna Pietri came up behind her brother and grabbed the arm he wasn’t using, shrieking: _“WHAT ARE YOU **DOING!** ”_ 

“They tried to kill me!” he half-shouted back, eyes wide. He was strangely… frantic. Lana hadn’t really known him _well,_ but his total lack of anything resembling fear or ethics or doubt or breaking his detachment from the world with anything but excitement had always been a reason for comment by people who _had_ worked closely with him. “They couldn’t do it before but they almost figured it out now and I can’t I can’t Gianna I can’t go back I can’t _they can’t lock me up again_ she said she wanted me to rot until the universe ended but I never get the chance to it’s always the dehydration and then the magic puts me back perfect and I do it again and again and again _I won’t **die-!**_ ”

That was _completely_ not what had just happened but she’d never convince _him_ of that and when Giovanna’s grip on her brother’s arm loosened he used the same simple trick Lana had to move her mother to shove her back across the room.

Lana couldn’t do anything useful to fight him, and she made her peace with that in the instant that Cassiel Navin turned back to her with that knife. Anything she did, magically, to try to defend herself was also out of the question. It might work very briefly, but then he’d just get through it-

And it wasn’t like she was Jäger. She didn’t _do_ hand-to-hand combat. She didn’t even really do combat-oriented magic. She could _do_ a sorcerer’s duel; but that was because when she was in a _normal_ part of the universe, with magic free for the taking from the surrounding environment, she was more powerful than just about anyone.

She wasn’t here. The easiest trick she had for a duel that would actually _work_ with magic she could feasibly take from herself was the flashy light-show she used when she was fighting with others- well, fighting was too strong a word. She always provided the distraction while everyone _else_ fought.

Lana couldn’t fight Cassiel Navin and she couldn’t defend herself, not with magic-

But she didn’t have to let him take her, either.

Lana looked Cassiel Navin dead in the eye, and said:

“I hope the Hunt tears you to pieces, this time.”

Then quick, before he could _do_ anything, a hand clapped to her chest and the other outstretched towards the Jäger-

Lana tried to pull on the amount of magic she was used to as half-Tylwyth quarter-Nation _Seelenkind._ Everything in her body started to fail at the same instant and she was bleeding from places she didn’t know she could bleed as she strip-mined her life-force to get all the magic her soul held before Cassiel Navin could kill her and take it for himself.

 ** _GET UP!_** was her last, silent spell as she shoved the magic out at the Jäger across the room.

* * *

Arik’s head cleared all in one instant, the white noise of the Hunt just being _gone_ unnaturally shoved away to some part of himself where _Elti Elti no oh God **Elti NO**_ couldn’t reach him on the conscious level.

He blinked, and saw Edward Kirkland-Héderváry try to shove Cassiel Navin away from his father and half-sibling, lying deathlike on the floor-

Joseph Kirkland-Héderváry was dead a few feet away from him and Lana Kirkland was lying in a spreading pool of her own blood and Cassiel Navin was holding a _Drakräder_ knife-

For one second, he thought he was going to be too late to stop yet another murder, but Cassiel just pushed Edward aside hard enough for the younger man to crack his head on the floor; and those few seconds were enough for Arik to get his feet under him and charge across the space separating them, changing as he went.

It was a bear that bowled Cassiel Navin over, and got between him and János and Árpád.

The witch was breathing too hard, smelled too scared- he hadn’t been like this when the Witchbreakers had been after him and he’d _laughed_ at all the times _Elti_ had failed to kill him, what had _happened_ to change that?

Cassiel Navin stared at him wide-eyed for just an instant before he turned on his heel and _ran._

Arik’s first instinct was to go right after him, but that could wait a second. He shook off the bear form and took quick stock of the room.

“Check them!” he snapped to Domdruc, pointing at Edward and János and Árpád. Amphitrite and Kore Despoina and Arion were down too but Arik couldn’t worry about maybe-dead Kings right now-

The Residence staff were all dead. Joseph and Lana and the staff made eleven more deaths on Cassiel Navin’s head.

He heard hyperventilating from somewhere- it was _Zia_ Gianna, _Zio_ Heinrich clutching her, looking shocky himself-

Arik looked to Emma, to tell her to take charge here while he went for Cassiel Navin, and was met with a glare of stubborn fury before he could even begin to open his mouth.

Of _course_ she wasn’t going to let this slide by her. She was a Witchbreaker- and, technically, _he_ wasn’t.

He reconsidered keeping her here in a split-second, that look sending a flurry of related thoughts through his head. She was a trained Witchbreaker, Hunt policy was you went for witches in at _least_ pairs, and he knew her and trusted her.

And she’d survived this long as a Witchbreaker without any magic at all, so she was _almost_ on home turf here in the magic-blocked Residence, and she’d throw herself into the fight with utter fearless single-mindedness. That legendary not-caring in a fight would be an advantage against someone as equally uncaring as Cassiel Navin _and_ he wouldn’t be fighting back with the same power-high of anticipated blood that Emma would-

“You, you,” Arik said, pointing first at _Tante_ Zell, then Øystein Brynjarsson- _Tante_ Zell was the only person he could think of who might keep something of a level head and he could tell that Øystein had gotten a bit of magic from somewhere and that was better than nothing even if it wouldn’t help if Cassiel Navin got back in here. “You’re in charge. Leutnant Miccichelo- with me!” 

* * *

On each floor of the Governor’s Residence they’d seen, a long hallway ran across the front of the building, with the main staircases at either end.

So Mosè and Luisa and Marlies were in the perfect position, worrying over their grandmother and aunt at the foot of the stairs, to see Cassiel Navin dash crosswise across the hallway, further down the length of the house, headed for what was probably the front door.

They all froze the instant they saw him, breathing again only after it was clear the witch hadn’t seen them.

“Do you think he-” Mosè started to say.

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Luisa replied, and they spent a moment just looking at each other.

“Luisa?” Marlies asked shakily.

She took a deep breath.

“Mosè, you should take _Tante_ and get Marlies out of here,” she said to him. “The way _Nonna_ ’s plan was. I should-”

“You’re not even a _Witchbreaker,_ Luisa!” Mosè protested. “And the _demon_ is that way!”

“Well someone needs to take care of _him_ and we don’t know what’s wrong with _Tante_ so she needs to be taken out of here and back to the Hunt. You’re not the sorcerer here.”

“I outrank you,” he half-threatened.

“But _I’m_ the senior officer,” she reminded him.

“By like eleven years!”

“ _You’re_ the one who promised _Papà_ you’d look after his sister,” Luisa said, and Mosè really couldn’t argue with that. He _had_ been the one to promise that.

“I promised I’d keep an eye on you, too,” he protested.

“ _Tante_ is more important to the Hunt,” Luisa told him. “And international politics. They can get by without _me._ ”

She turned and started to stride down the hallway, gun out, to do something about Cassiel Navin, and Mosè almost wanted to grab her and make her come with them out the back door instead of letting her do her duty.

“You’re going to have to help,” he told Marlies instead. “I’m not going to be able to keep an eye out for danger very well why I’m doing this, so that’s on you.”

“I don’t know what to look for!” Marlies exclaimed, as he knelt down on the floor and manhandled his aunt into lying across his back, so her arms were draped over his shoulders. He crossed her arms so he could grab her opposite wrists, and carefully stood.

“Just make sure we’re not about to run into anyone,” he told her, testing his balance. He had to lean forward and keep his knees more bent so that he was actually supporting his aunt’s weight with his back instead of dislocating her shoulders, and he didn’t want to unbalance while holding her. She’d already fallen down an entire flight of stairs, and he had no idea what she’d managed to hurt.

The front hallway joined a cross-ways passage to the back of the building, in line with the front door. Mosè resolutely ignored his older sister, scoping out the situation beyond the front door, and hurried Marlies as fast as he could towards the back of the building.

They didn’t encounter anyone else, but clearly someone had been through here. A hole had been kicked in the wall to bypass a security checkpoint.

It took some coordination to get Nia through the hole. Marlies had to go through first, and Mosè had to put her down, and then pass her through, and it took long enough that people started shooting, up at the front of the Residence.

Mosè risked a bit of a run once he’d gotten his aunt repositioned on his back, once they got to the back door. They had no idea what was going on with the demon out front, now, and if they didn’t run-

The fear was unfounded, at least. Still, he didn’t risk yelling to the surprisingly small number of Jäger out in the road beyond the Residence’s fence until they were almost to the gate.

“General Costa!”

He didn’t recognize any of these Jäger, though the faces were familiar- they were all Regiment Jäger, not Department Jäger. He would have known them on sight, otherwise.

“Any of you have field medic training?” Mosè demanded, as two of the Jäger snatched Marlies away and hustled her towards the police cordon, and the remaining three helped him get his aunt safely to the ground.

“No training,” one of them, a huldrene, said. “But I’ve got some experience. Mostly from the Apennines, during the Civil War.”

 _God,_ that had been so long ago.

“I don’t know what happened,” Mosè told her. “She was fine one second and then the next she just _collapsed-_ ”

“We _all_ did,” a different Jäger told him, and he had a moment of suppressed panic. He’d _noticed_ the feeling of _‘Hunt’_ disappearing, but he’d thought it would come back when he left the Residence.

It hadn’t.

“She was at the top of a flight of stairs and she fell the whole way down,” Mosè continued, trying not to get frantic. If it wasn’t coming back and _Tante_ was still- “I’m _certain_ she hit her head at least once but I don’t know where or how many times. She’s breathing but it’s weak and shallow and I haven’t checked her heartbeat yet. I don’t think she broke anything but there might be fractures. No external bleeding but I don’t know about internal bleeding or bruising.”

Now that he’d noticed that the feeling of _‘Hunt’_ was still gone, there was something else bothering him but he couldn’t figure out _what._

“If she didn’t break anything there’s not really anything we can do here,” the huldrene Jäger said to him. She sounded shaken. “She’s not waking up now that she’s back in a magical environment and I don’t know _what_ could be causing that. She’s going to need a hospital at the _very_ least-”

“The _shooting,_ ” Mosè realized. _That_ was what else was wrong. “They were shooting out front like two minutes ago, why’d they stop- _Cassiel Navin_ is running around loose-”

_“What?”_

“I’m going to go-” Mosè started to say, but was suddenly drowned out by a screaming, screeching roar.

He’d been too young when _Tante_ came back from Honalee to remember the Hunt after Mephistopheles, but there had been plenty of video. He’d even seen some of it for school.

 _“Demon!”_ he burst out; blood running cold.

It was the only even semi-constructive reaction he could have to this situation, because his aunt had spent all his physical ammunition shooting out the windows to provide a diversion they hadn’t needed and the Hunt-

Mosè wasn’t sure that the Hunt _existed,_ right now.

* * *

Diana had frozen, partly from the shock of the part of herself that made her Jäger being ripped away; and partly from horror, watching her husband jerk out of the haze he’d fallen into, holding off the demon, and topple over sideways.

He was lying dead in the road not twenty feet from the demon and-

Zannah Brahe threw herself in front of Nico’s body and her hands flew up in front of her face and she _screamed_ something at the demon, Latin maybe, before it could begin to take the step forward that put it within arm’s reach of Nico, and the golden-green light of visible magic flared into a sigil in the space between them.

The demon seized in place and hissed at her, long and low and threatening.

That sound broke Diana out of her shock, and she quickly looked around to see if anything _else_ had gone wrong.

The other Jäger seemed to have snapped out of their own reactions to the feeling of _‘Hunt’_ tearing away from themselves in reaction to the noise as well, but for Lord Hiruz. He was pressed to the ground, eyes shut and ears folded tightly back, and clearly not in any state to give orders.

She looked for Ivan next, and found him not that far away from Lord Hiruz, brains and blood scattered across the street.

“Untermarschall?” Demyanev asked quietly, and for a moment Diana was stuck in the mental rut of _oh shit oh shit I’m the highest ranking person here fit to command **I’m in charge here now FUCK.**_

These were almost all Regiment Jäger, not Department Jäger. _She_ wasn’t Regiment, she’d _never_ been Regiment, she’d always been Department. She didn’t _do_ field command!

 _Get a hold of yourself,_ she told herself, and looked over to Demyanev.

They were both High Command, they could _do_ this. Demyanev was Regiment, Witchbreaker, she could make him help.

Diana took a deep breath and went to check on her husband, and find out what Zannah Brahe was doing.

It was so wrong, seeing Nico still lying there. He _always_ got back up. She knew there was still magic here, even if she’d gotten so used to it that it had been centuries since it had grated against her nerves; and if there was magic around then no magic-using full _Seelenkind_ should die and _stay_ dead-

Diana pushed down the preemptive grief, and made herself stand up. Now wasn’t the time.

“Investigator Brahe,” Demyanev said to Zannah.

The woman was shaking, Diana saw. It was some pretty severe shaking; and she bet that it, and the tears streaming down her face, came from pure terror.

“It’s a binding sigil,” Zannah told them, voice watery and, yes, utterly terrified. “It’s an emergency measure in case you messed something up with the _actual_ binding you’re supposed to use it and get the people working with you to fix the binding inscriptions and then you’re supposed to _drop_ it all it does is freezes the demon in place it doesn’t-”

She had to stop to breath. It was too loud, and shaky.

“I don’t know how long it will work or I can hold it it doesn’t need anything but concentration but it’s not _meant_ to be used for a long time and, and you can’t attack the demon through it there’s a set edge and if you disrupt it-!”

“We won’t, then,” Diana promised, forcing her own voice into calm. “Demyanev, help me move my husband.”

They carried him back away from Zannah and the demon, to about the same distance that everyone had been giving _him,_ before.

What else was there to do?

“Why haven’t they _moved?_ ” Diana demanded, looking to the police-held media cordon. She pointed to some nearby Jäger. “You! Get them _out_ of he-”  

The rest of the word died on her lips, because out of the corner of her eye she saw Demyanev go stiff, staring at the Governor’s Residence; and she looked over too and saw Cassiel Navin walking out of the Residence, holding one of the long _Drakräder_ knives, the iron glistening with blood even from this distance.

Because of _course_ everything would go wrong at once.

Who was it? Who had he-

 _“Árpád,”_ Terenzia whispered, tone strained, and Diana jumped and glanced over. _Both_ of her children were there, Vasco clutching his younger sister’s arm in a death grip- right, Edward Héderváry was missing too who did they even think they were fooling-

Diana was about to tell them to go watch their father, or Odette and Ravenna, when someone started shooting from inside the Residence.

Two, three bullets hit Cassiel. He staggered slightly, but then straightened up in the way that told her he’d _healed-_

 ** _“Stop shooting!”_** Demyanev screamed to the Residence. **_“Stop shooting!”_**

Right, stray bullets gone just the wrong way could disrupt the effect of the binding sigil, and any gone a _different_ wrong way might come towards _them._

But that was less important than the fact that Cassiel Navin had managed to get enough magic in a magic-locked area to _heal_ himself without looking concerned about it-

He was headed for the demon.

“If Zannah keeps holding it,” Demyanev told her in an undertone. “Navin’s going to be able to do his own binding.”

Oh God, she did _not_ want this to be her decision.

But-

“If she lets it go to keep it from him, it can just turn on us,” Diana said. “Between the two, I’d rather deal with Cassiel Navin with a demon at his back.”

She really hoped she didn’t come to regret that decision.

* * *

The shooting began and ended basically as soon as they hit the top of the stairs. It was temporarily worrying, but then they were bursting out the formal dining room and Luisa Costa was calling to them from the front door and she stepped aside to let them through to the lawn and Cassiel Navin and the demon.

In front of her, Arik flowed into a new form. She unsheathed the iron _Drakräder_ knife she carried, that Domdruc had taught her on, and charged right past him to put herself between witch and demon.

Personally, Emma wouldn’t have chosen a unicorn in a magicless place, because it seemed like trying to change to something magical in such an environment seemed like it could go horribly- but they _were_ going after Cassiel Navin, and if Arik could drain him of the magic he’d gathered, he wouldn’t have a way to replace it, here.

For minute or two, it looked like it was working.

Arik knocked Cassiel Navin off his feet and the witch retaliated with magic, which Arik tore away immediately. Cassiel scrambled back and Arik struck out with his hooves, trying to drive him back towards the Residence, or at least away from the demon.

Emma had gotten between Cassiel Navin and the demon, frozen in place in the knocked-down gate by _Zannah Brahe- that_ was going to be a problem later on- when Cassiel Navin managed to roll away from Arik far enough to lunge back in once his hooves had hit the lawn and shove the _Drakräder_ knife into the thick bunched pectoral muscles at the base of Arik’s neck by the leg.

Arik went down screaming. Árpád had told her that horses sometimes screamed when they got hurt, but she hadn’t heard it before.

It was worse with Arik, because he went down with the knife- the _iron_ knife- as a unicorn. People often said that the Tylwyth Teg were the ones most susceptible to iron, but it wasn’t true. Tylwyth _glamours,_ yes. The Tylwyth themselves, no. That was unicorns. Even the hobbled unicorns the mist spirits kept tied up in steel _hated_ the steel of the bridles and shoes enough that they’d beat themselves to death on the sides of a stall if you didn’t watch them.

If you could break off an iron spear point or arrowhead in a unicorn-

 Arik’s instinct was to shift back to his natural form but the iron was living hell to his unicorn-form and he couldn’t shift out properly so he lying on the ground, thrashing in a mix of unicorn and human aspects and hurting _both_ more by moving.

When you got stabbed, it was better to leave the blade in to keep the bleeding down, but if that knife didn’t come out, Arik was going to kill himself trying to get away from it before the iron could even do much to him beyond the stab wound.

And Cassiel Navin would help it along, so he could use Arik’s death for power.

She had to get him away from Arik, and _also_ keep him away from the demon. She’d have to get him to come after her, the way he’d tried to go after János and Árpád, ignoring Edward even when he tried to get in the way- that sort of focus would keep him distracted from the demon.

She’d have to be something he was scared of, so she became top priority.

Emma bit down on the inside of her mouth until she bled and dredged up everything she’d ever learned about magical theory and practice.

She readjusted her grip on the _Drakräder_ knife and darted in, slapping Cassiel Navin’s nearest shoulder with just her fingers so she could disengage quickly, and get the space she needed between them.

The spark she’d managed with blood magic caught on the fabric of Cassiel’s shirt, catching his attention immediately. He slapped out the little flame and pulled his stolen knife from Arik, who settled, wheezing in pain, into human form.

Emma put on a sharp, challenging smile, dripping with self-assurance bordering on arrogance; and her best Roman-accented Italian.

“Witchbreaker Miccichelo,” she introduced herself, raising her knife into the proper guard position. “Come and get me, _witch._ ”  

Cassiel Navin bought the implication Emma had woven around herself- _‘Witchbreaker’_ and the tongue of flame for _‘sorcerer’_ , _‘Miccichelo’_ for _‘Seelenkind’_ \- without a second thought. He came for her, convinced she was the most dangerous thing in the area.

He used his knife like a novice on a sword, swinging whenever he thought he’d gotten in range, trying to cut her. _Drakräder_ knives weren’t meant for that.

Emma used hers properly. She had two feet of cold iron in hand, and knew how to keep her movements tight, putting the flat of the blade between herself and the magic Cassiel Navin threw at her, dissipating or deflecting hasty improvised spells and simple magic bursts in showers of golden-green light against the iron.

But still- _Drakräder_ couldn’t properly fight with one knife, and Emma wasn’t technically _Drakräder._ The long knife was useful against witches, used like this; and though she _could_ use the other knives in a passable imitation of a _Drakräder_ , she didn’t carry the other knives or the belt of thin needles or the knuckledusters, or wear the buff coat or the arm guards.

And Witchbreakers fought with backup. She was on her own here, trying to distract rather than fight an offensive, and Cassiel Navin was _Seelenkind_ witch. He couldn’t draw on any magic outside himself save for what he’d already gathered; but he was still an experienced sorcerer, and adaptable. He was getting hits she couldn’t block with her knife, and trying to tie it up with his own so he could get a clean body shot.

She couldn’t stay in one spot like this. He’d get her.

Of course, he’d get her soon, anyway. Skill she could work with, luck she couldn’t. It would fall in his favor soon enough.

But where to go?

On a turn, her first concession to Cassiel Navin’s assault, the Residence’s fence came into view. She’d been by here a few times before, to drop Reno off or pick him up, and remembered seeing it up close.

It was more decorative than anything, but it was wrought-iron.

Arik’s strategy was still fresh in her mind, and it was a _good_ strategy. It was probably the only one that could work, because she doubted that anyone would be able to stand up to a sorcerous _Seelenkind_ without some sort of pre-fighting preparation. It didn’t even matter that technically, his power was limited- he had eleven deaths and the entire contents of the jar of concentrated magic she’d carried in to draw on.

She wouldn’t last that long.

Emma gave ground, letting Cassiel Navin drive her back towards the fence.

The only plan she had would get her yelled at by Dom and Mäelle and Arik and Generalleutnant Demyanev and Marschall Braginski and probably even the Jagdsprinz and _definitely_ her _Bisnonno_ for its absurd dangerousness and totally reckless approach to self-preservation, if she survived it. If she didn’t, well, they could just curse her at her funeral.

Once she was getting close to the fence, Emma purposefully disengaged, backing up quickly to get up against the fence. She switched her knife to her off hand and drew her gun with her newly-free dominant hand-

Then threw the knife away.

In the moment’s hesitation Cassiel Navin had over the action, in his confusion, she raised her now-empty hand, as though she _was_ actually a sorcerer about to try some magic.   

That was all the opening the witch needed. He lunged in and skewered her guts on his stolen knife.

It hurt. She’d never been stabbed like that, and even though she’d tried to brace herself mentally for it, it hurt.

Someone on the other side of the fence was yelling- probably at her for doing something so _utterly stupid._

The only part of the plan she’d been worried about was that she wouldn’t be able to feel Cassiel Navin trying to pull the magic out of her soul; but she _could_ feel the tug of it as he tried to drain her and pull her life-force apart faster, her quickly-spilling blood providing power for both herself and the man trying to kill her.

She clapped her raised hand down on his nearest shoulder, like she was clutching at him in her last moments, and _focused._

It wasn’t so different from making the little flame a minute or two ago.

Emma pulled her physical hand away from Cassiel Navin in the same moment she yanked back at the tug of his magic at hers with her mental hands. He was so close that she felt _and_ heard his stutter of breath as she turned the tables on him, tearing _all_ of his stolen magic away from him.

The hand she’d on him fell, wreathed in the intense glow of the stolen magic, as her other came up.

The first hand fell against the fence and she _pushed_ the magic away from her. It dissipated in an eye-searing streaking flash against the iron, even as the witch tried to pull it back.

Her other hand came up into position a second later, the barrel of her gun resting gently, perfectly, against the ridge of bone that separated forehead from temple, just above the outer edge of his left eye.

Emma Miccichelo blew Cassiel Navin’s brains out across the lawn of the Governor’s Residence, and managed to stay standing long enough to make sure that he hadn’t somehow managed to take back enough magic to give him another resurrection.

He stayed down, and Domdruc’s long knife grated painfully against the decorative iron bars and designs in the fence as she fell to her knees.

Emma caught herself on her hands, and used the last of her real strength to lie herself down on her side in the grass.

The Hunt would have to handle the rest of this without her.

* * *

Cassiel Navin was _dead_ and Terenzia had about half a second to be totally and completely shocked by this, because the magic Emma Miccichelo had grounded against the iron had flashed out sideways, along the fence, towards Zannah Brahe and the demon.

She wasn’t totally conscious of the fact that she’d done a sort of magic that didn’t come that naturally to her, and stepped herself over to Zannah Brahe, until she was _there,_ grabbing the NCO Auxiliary officer in anticipation of the binding sigil being disrupted any-

The flash had mostly dissipated by the time it reached the broken-in gates but even a little magic was enough.

Zannah’s binding sigil broke, the demon moved, and Terenzia stepped the two of them _away._

They came out by Odette and Ravenna. Behind them, Demyanev and Vasco and the other present Witchbreakers and Hunt sorcerers moved to throw everything they had at the demon. There was a booming _crak_ , Zorya calling down lightning again.

“You should,” Terenzia started to tell them, then gasped for breath. “Get out of here!”

The Hunt, such as it was without there being any _feeling_ of Hunt, wasn’t going to be able to take the demon down. Not without the Jagdsprinz’s power.

* * *

They managed to act like nothing had gone wrong for a couple of minutes, but then Ahes came striding over.

“I _felt_ you doing something,” she informed them, then looked down at the stone paving of the road, where Maria had drawn the Jagdsprinz’s glyph-name in Nadri’s blood.

Her eyes narrowed.

“We were just going to bring her here!” Reno told her quickly. “She should know that you’re here and we didn’t know if you’d want to go see _all_ of the Hunt-”

“You should have _asked,_ ” she cut him off, and her chin rose haughtily in a way Reno recognized. _Mítera_ got like that when someone had just inadvertently insulted her. “I am no _witch._ I have nothing to hide from the Hunt. Take me to the Jagdsprinz.”

“Maybe,” Maria said hesitantly. “Maybe- maybe _Elti_ was already Hunting the demon. Maybe that’s why it didn’t work. I don’t think we should drop in on the middle of a Hunt. But I could take you to _Mère,_ and we could wait for _Elti_ to come back.”

“As you like,” Ahes said, quite coolly, and Reno grabbed Nadri and Sebastian’s hands without being asked. Maria took her brother’s and Ahes’s, and pulled them all to Empress Odette.

Reno had been expecting the Jagdshall, or maybe Prarayer, or even their place in Kharad.

Instead, it was instant mayhem of magic and the demon screeching in anticipation of the kill and Jäger shouting at each other and Empress Odette’s shocked face and Terenzia Agresta yelling _“Where the **hell** did you just come from!” _basically right in his ear and _Ravenna._

He dropped Nadri and Sebastian’s hands and grabbed his fiancée instead.

“Maria!” he said urgently, trying to get her attention. She was staring at the demon- or maybe Ahes, who was sweeping towards the mixed group of Witchbreakers and Jäger sorcerers. “ _Maria!_ We have to-”

“I can’t find _Elti!_ ” she exclaimed, panicked. She whirled to face her mother. “ _Mère,_ where’s-”

Empress Odette grabbed her children.

“She’s in the Residence somewhere we think,” she told her daughter. “Maria, you have to-”

“I can smell her,” Nadri interrupted.

Maria pushed her mother off and stared at his sister.

_“Where-”_

“Around the back of the building, I think-”

Maria grabbed her brother and was gone before Reno could catch her and shake her and tell her that _she had to get them out of here first!_

So he clutched Ravenna instead, mouth dry, and tried to think through the haze of terror in his head to come up with _any way_ that water could be helpful in this situation.

* * *

Slavadan Demyanev had come to Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor’s Hunt when Zvezda Kascheiyivna and Boreas had called to the people of Buyan to stand with the then to-be Jagdsprinz against the demon Mephistopheles.

Then, after it was done, he’d gone back to Kitzeh. He came back the next year, with a number of the others who had Hunted that day with Teufelmördor, bearing the skull and wings of the demon; but some days, he still regretted not staying once that first Hunt had finished.

He had been fully prepared to die here in the street, in Kharad, robbed of the magic that had made him Jäger but still possessed of the name and standing for the Hunt’s duty and honor, against this other demon, when a woman he’d never seen stepped into their midst.

Platinum-blonde and eyes burning the blue-white of lightning, she stood before the demon like it was nothing to her. It screeched at her, and she just raised her hands.

Space twisted and collapsed onto itself. The air exploded into ghostly pale blue, a darker shade of her eyes, and became unbreathable, deoxygenated and scorching. The concrete of the road evaporated. The iron of the gate glowed white-hot so briefly that Demyanev wasn’t totally sure it wasn’t a hallucination brought on by the lack of oxygen as he tried to stagger back to breathable atmosphere, and then sublimated to gas. Light bent wrong around the woman and the demon and gravity went strange, wind and bits of dirt and gravel wooshing into abnormal pockets of force. Lightning crackled and went to ground on the edges of the fence and Demyanev jerked as sudden magnetism pulled on his officer’s knife, his gun, the fastenings on his belt and boots and jacket, the bits of hematite in the bead bracelet on his wrist.

His blood buzzing, the trace amounts of iron reacting the natural forces at work barely feet away from him, he stepped back, out of the inevitable bleeding edges of a tightly-controlled field effect that hadn’t been otherwise bound by physical components.

The woman stood unaffected within her own impossible magic while the demon contorted under the unnatural confluence of fundamental forces, pushed and pulled out of shape in sickening cracks of bone and the soft undertone of tearing of muscle and ligaments.

But it fought back, still, and shoved against the forces imposed on it hard enough to create an unaffected pocket around itself, snapping back together and healing in a handful of instants. For a moment, it stood in the midst of this little bit of misbehaving universe, as untouched as the woman who was forcing electromagnetism, gravity, and the nuclear forces to bend to her will.

It moved just the slightest bit and the woman’s hand shot out, formed a fist, and the demon flickered in a way Demyanev recognized- the flicker of someone being pulled back to place in the middle of trying to teleport away.

“Who the fuck is this,” Vasco said, tone too flat, and Demyanev half-looked over at him, unable to totally take his eyes away from the woman.

The other sorcerer looked extremely cowed.

“I have no idea,” Demyanev told him. “It doesn’t matter.”

It really didn’t. She was facing off against the demon, and she seemed just as capable of keeping it at bay as Nico; which meant she was buying them time.

“We need to get everyone else out of here.”

* * *

Sebastian was caught off-guard by Maria just grabbing him and dropping them around the back of the Governor’s Residence, but not nearly as much as the Jäger there were.

 _Elti_ was lying on the ground, Mosè hovering uncertainly next to her, and he was on his knees next to her before he’d really thought about it.

Maria should have brought _Reno,_ not him, _Reno_ was the one who could heal people!

“I can’t _find_ her!” Maria screeched, and he winced at the assault on his hearing. _“I can’t-”_

“She’s not dead!” he yelled over her. He had his fingers on her pulse to prove it, even if it was a weak thing.

_“I can’t **find her!** ”_

Sebastian shut out her hysterics and breathed out.

The universe was a shocking _mess_ from the shadow-side, looking directly at the magic. Everything was all-

The foundation of it all had _cracked,_ like the universe had been rocked by a major earthquake, or someone had tried to flatten it all with bombs.

How hadn’t they _felt_ something like this happening?

The worst of it was- he couldn’t truly say that it was _around_ his _Elti,_ because _-_

 _Elti_ wasn’t there. He could tell she wasn’t dead, but she wasn’t _there._ Around her… temporarily-vacated body, things were- just _missing,_ maybe. Like someone had struck cracks in reality.

Well, he knew to go to for _that._

He came back to his body and grabbed his sister.

“You have to calm down!” he told her. “Something horrible’s happened, Maria- something with the magic! There’s _cracks_ in it around _Elti,_ it’s like the edge of reality, and I don’t know how to _fix_ it! You have to calm down so I can show you!”

“I don’t know _how-_ ”

“Just sit down and close your eyes after I go out walking, and take a deep breath and imagine you’re leaving your body on the exhale! I’ll pull you out.”

He waited just long enough to make sure she was sitting down to drop back out of himself. He _really_ didn’t like the way things were looking around _Elti,_ and he wanted that fixed before he went looking for _Elti_ herself.

He grabbed Maria’s shadow-soul on her exhale and fought to pull her out of her body. She’d agreed to go but she wasn’t really suited for this sort of thing, and she resisted him automatically.

It did work, eventually. It just took a minute, and then Maria was clutching at his arms and staring wide-eyed at him.

“Hey,” he said, when she didn’t react for a moment. Bringing her out of her body _shouldn’t_ have hurt her- no one had every _told_ him that he could do this, he’d just known that it could work the way he’d always been able to tell what the different parts of the soul were, and he knew he hadn’t damaged her at all- but maybe she’d been scared stiff, or something.

Maria blinked, and gripped him tighter.

“I _found_ her,” she said, and Sebastian found himself suddenly yanked away again, the second time in _maybe_ three minutes.

This time was worse.

It wasn’t like when she’d helped him around the security on their place on campus or the wards in the Honda-Brynjarsson’s library, where it had felt like being pulled _up_ and then dropped _down-_

Maria pulled them _through_ those cracks he’d been so worried about.

They came out in the nothingness-chaos outside reality, right next to the Jagdsprinz, and Sebastian wanted to curl up on himself and _hide_ until it went away.

He’d never thought of the Jagdsprinz as anyone, anything but _Elti._ He’d had a vague conception of the Jagdsprinz’s _power_ as something semi-separate, since it was something she had to call up, but even knowing that the summoning ritual for the Kings called the _Jagdsprinz,_ period,rather than Erlkönig or Teufelmördor, he hadn’t thought that the Jagdsprinz was something completely separate.

The Jagdsprinz was big, massive, _huge;_ a soul-sucking black that almost really wasn’t a color at all and the presence of it was terrifyingly oppressive it saw _everything_ it knew-

Its head swung around, its eyes two dull-glowing red dying stars under jagged antlers that arched back over impossible distance that didn’t actually exist here, crowning an elongated head with a mouth of sharp teeth not covered by lips that couldn’t even close and just enough of Sebastian’s mind didn’t close down in terror for him to deeply, _deeply_ regret his entire life; because absolutely _nothing_ in it had ever prepared him to see something like _this_ it looked at him and he just wanted to tear out his insides and _die_ to escape it’s notice to get away to go where it couldn’t follow him.

 **Little soul-changer and the world-builder,** it said but there weren’t words this was less than words it was deep soundless bass vibration in the bones with meaning and intent and the Jagdsprinz’s eyes flared to the orange-red of breathed-over coals at their centers. **How did you get here.**

“Y-you’re not _Elti_ ,” Maria whispered, voice shaking, and how was she even capable of _speaking_ right now?

**I have no children. I am the growing dark of autumn nights. I am the stalking dark of living nightmares. I am the chase and the spilling of the blood and the screams and the pain and the fear. I am justice. I am law. I am the final judge of all things. Nothing escapes me and nothing can hide from me. I am the quiet at the end of the fight and the stillness in the graveyard. I am the roaring of vengeance looking for satisfaction and the fury of thunderstorms smiting the earth. I have no end but there was a beginning. I have countless parents, but I have no children.**

What could _possibly_ give birth to something like _this-_

 **I am the tatters of traitors and oathbreakers and murderers and witches, little soul-changer,** the Jagdsprinz said and _Sebastian hadn’t spoken_ it just _knew_ and it made him want to rip his brain and dash it to pieces so he’d be _safe._ **I am born from the rupture of society as death-curses come from the last breath of an undeserved murder. Societies are contracts and contracts are every bit as living as any soul, and in their death-throes they call to me to avenge them. I am justice from iniquity and renewing strength from shattering flaws.**      

The Jagdsprinz leaned in close _too close_ close enough to _touch-_

Its nose bumped his chest, so gentle, and its nostrils flared in a warm, damp exhale that smelled slightly of wood rot and fermenting leaf-litter and earth after the rain.

 **Calm, little soul-changer. You have done wrong, but no wrong that I am bound to rectify.**  

That made it easier to breath, suddenly; and he _was_ calm. The Jagdsprinz was still so big, so powerful, but it wasn’t something to be _scared_ of, any longer. It just _was._

It was even a little comforting to know this was what the Jagdsprinz was, now that the terror was gone. It was so powerful- surely nothing bad could ever possibly escape it.

“Where’s _Elti_?” Maria asked, her voice a little stronger than last time. “I can _feel_ her-”

**_Foolish, thoughtless child!_ **

Sebastian flinched, but Maria _cowered_ , shrinking down on herself. Her next breath was a sob.

 **You have no idea of what you have done, world-builder,** the Jagdsprinz told her. **You know _nothing._ You birthed a universe in the nothing that makes my bones and tried to _summon_ me across it, without any preparation!**

“She did _what._ ”

 **Look up,** the Jagdsprinz said.

Sebastian did. Hanging in the nothingness-chaos above them was the Shining City, the edge of the universe clear around it-

It was so small. _Too_ small. It brushed what he thought was the back edge of the Shining City, and curved around, encompassing the city, and the stardust bridge, and a vast expanse of space, but-

There was nothingness-chaos between the bubble of the Shining City, and the edge of he _had_ thought of _‘everything’_.

 **Infinite from within,** the Jagdsprinz told him. **Finite from without. Such is the nature of minds and universes.**

“I,” Maria sobbed. “I only- I just- I wanted to go as far as I could-”

 **Your farthest was farther than you knew,** the Jagdsprinz said, and- _sighed?_ **It is not entirely your fault. You were not meant to exist. This is not the way of things. But you are the children of Teufelmördor, and there has been meddling where there should not have been in things that were not properly understood.**

The Jagdsprinz bared its teeth.

**Ereshkigal and Nanshe have been due for words from me for centuries. I shall seize the opportunity. They are not expecting _me._  **

“Uh,” Sebastian said. “Uh. Your- uh. Jagdsprinz. Maria’s kind of right. Where _is_ our _Elti_? We do need her back.”

 **I am of this place in my bones,** the Jagdsprinz told him. **I must be so. I must see all that occurs to judge all, so I cannot be _of_ creation. I am tied to it, intrinsically, but I am not of it. I am the eternal outsider. Teufelmördor can withstand me, but she cannot withstand this place. I am protecting her. She is not meant to be here. **

Sebastian got the feeling that its ears- if it _had_ ears- twitched.

 **You are not truly meant to be here, either,** it said. **You are of the universe. But- meddling, as I said.**

“Well. Can we have her back? So we can take her back,” Sebastian said. “Things kind of- well, maybe it’s because of you. You said you were intrinsically tied to creation, and everything is sort of, uh, broken. I think.”

 **I am not surprised,** the Jagdsprinz said. **Show me the way back, little soul-changer, and I will take us.**

“Oh, well, if you’ve got _Elti_ ,” he told it. “Then it’s okay. Maria can take us. Maria can go _anywhere._ ”

The Jagdsprinz threw its head back and _laughed._

**Of course she can. Take us home, world-builder.**

* * *

The Jagdsprinz’s return to the universe released the pressure everything had been under, trying to keep up the essential connection between magic and the power that had been torn away. The part of the universe you saw shadow-walking calmed, smoothed out. Broken spells stayed broken, but ones that had simply malfunctioned started working properly again. The sorcerers and the fey and the fey-blooded felt the change immediately, and were able to finally relax.

AIs let out digital sighs and spread out through their networks again, souls unfolding and tentatively stretching, testing the immaterial data waters and quickly, quietly, putting the streams back in order. Apologies whispered across the screens and databanks as infrastructure across the galaxy righted itself and emergency response systems were strained to the outer limits of their range, searching for the distress signals of the ships that been lost out in dead space when the tow-beacons failed.

The lightspeed paths flickered back to life, and green lights flicked on in technical centers in spaceports across the galaxy, indicating that the ways were clear and open.

The Kings of Honalee existed in a single moment of calm, then woke all at once, drained and a little wrung-out, but alive.

Nations across the galaxy twitched, and those who had simply died, not killed themselves, came back to life as abruptly as they’d left it, able to return now that Jagdsprinz was there to enforce and maintain the systems and structures that kept the societies and cultures they lived to embody functioning.

In Kharad, in the street in front of the Governor’s Residence where Ahes and Belial still fought, Lord Hiruz shivered, all over, and got shakily to his feet. The feeling of _‘Hunt’_ had not returned, but something was _right_ again.

Nico breathed in, and rolled over to blink blearily at the developments that had happened in the minutes he’d been dead, trying to comprehend them through a retreating mental fog.

At the foot of the stairs that Nia had fallen down, Feliciano sat up from where Mosè and Luisa and Marlies had left her, and looked around, alarmed at the absence of her family. She stood.

Below, in the kitchen, the time-stranded Nations rose as well.

Ludwig woke to Zell and Heinrich both trying to get close enough for a reassuring hug.

Rahel, Cristoforo, and Gilbert had first Giovanna, incoherent through her hysterics; and then Edward, stammering through an explanation about Cassiel and mistaken points in personal timelines and murder.

Arthur opened his eyes to find Irene crying over the body of her dead daughter, a woman he hadn’t really believed to be the same person as the little girl he remembered with a fairy friend on her shoulder; but had given her life to keep her single-remaining son, his father, and his half-sibling alive.

The cliff under János’s feet disappeared, and Árpád let go of him as they started to leave the edge of death.

János took a shuddering breath, back in life, and looked for his sons and Lana. He found two corpses.

Around the back of the building, Sebastian gently pushed Maria back into her body, and dropped back into his own.

He resettled himself on the street to wait for _Elti_ , trusting that the Jagdsprinz could sort her and itself out.

Nia’s breathing and heartbeat strengthened and deepened as her soul returned.

When she opened her eyes, when she stood, the Jagdsprinz came with her.

It was like nothing that Sebastian had ever heard described- not a regular Hunt, not _Mère_ ’s telling of summoning the Jagdsprinz to release her from being Princess of the Tylwyth Teg. The Jagdsprinz was so much bigger than _Elti_ \- not as large as it had been outside the universe, but still large, probably equal in size to the demon.

It was more defined here, too. The jagged antlers still arched back in a sweeping spread and the eyes still glowed, but the front parts of a body were visible, shoulder and torso and leg and knee and hoof when it stepped forwards and a the limb freed itself, or formed itself, from the thick smoky bleeding-black edges of its body the darkened the air around it.

Altogether, it was a strange, slightly upsetting scene. _‘Inside’_ was _Elti_ in her armor, looking odd without her helm, given the situation; but alert and conscious, mirroring the Jagdsprinz on the _‘outside’_ , the great monstrous deer-like _thing_ that was a weight like none had ever felt in the magic around them.

 **I am the Hunt,** the Jagdsprinz said, and it was the same deep bass vibration as from the nothingness-chaos; but it was magnified here, since it had ground and air to travel through. Sebastian could feel his teeth rattle.

 _Elti_ ’s mouth moved, but if she was speaking along with the Jagdsprinz, her voice was lost.

  **I am the stalking dark and the death-curse of those who deserve and desire vengeance. I am _called._**

* * *

János almost hadn’t needed to see the bodies. He’d already known that Joseph and Lana were dead.

Finding Cassiel Navin gone was no surprise. It was the logical conclusion.

“János-” his mother tried to say, but he stood and pushed past her.

Everyone cleared out his way as he headed for the door.

He wasn’t in danger of dying, but his anchors were still in place and really he should have dropped them already because it was keeping his body from totally reintegrating with the rest of his soul but

Lana and Joseph were dead and Cassiel Navin was going to _pay_ for that, and for Svana and his father, and something was calling to him, promising him-

He walked out of the kitchen and up the stairs, across the dining room, to the front door. Luisa Costa pressed herself up against the wall, trying to avoid him. There wasn’t magic here, but sündeyalacgh didn’t _need_ magic.

János was walking in two levels of the world at once, shadow and physical, as he left the Governor’s Residence. He only stopped when Cassiel Navin’s body was at his feet.

Dead, already.

But he’d been _promised._

The pull of magic shifted, and János looked up from the ground to see the Jagdsprinz fall on the demon, lightning and gravity playing across the edges of its form as it sunk its teeth into the demon and the demon roared and tried to tear at it, hands raking ineffectually through incorporeal skin and tangling in antlers with prongs just as sharp as its claws.

Cassiel Navin was dead, but the demon that had pulled him out of Tartarus, the demon that had fed on his father- _it_ wasn’t dead yet.

János raised his hands, grabbed the barrier the demon had put down to keep ambient magic from the Governor’s Residence, and tore it away.

The magic came back.

Turning the barrier inside-out, squeezing it down to fit between his cupped hands- that was _easy,_ like this, on the border between purely physical and purely magical, able to _be_ both and _use_ both at the same time.

János rounded on the demon, forcing it back with a blow of magic. The Jagdsprinz followed, smoky black body blocking off the storm of gravity and electromagnetism and destruction that _had_ been holding it, so he could do his work unaffected.

The demon hissed, almost mixing it with a laugh. It wasn’t scared of him.

He shoved the broken barrier towards it, pushing it _through_ and _out-_

János touched the demon’s soul and pulled the barrier, made of its own power and own will, tight around the part of itself that let the demon access magic.

Belial _screamed,_ and tried to claw him reach him to strike him down, but the Jagdsprinz caught its claws in its antlers, protecting him.

János took a breath, resettled himself on his feet, and reached out.

Lightning, fundamental physical forces, pulled from the sorcerer he didn’t know standing beyond the Jagdsprinz in her halo of ghostly pale blue, for the soul-essence.

Iron, metaphysically, a handful of the Jagdsprinz’s tatter-bleeding edges, for the body.

He pulled the two together around his hand, dark smoke and lightning, and lunged forward on one leg, fingers held together and pointed straight at the demon, a strike-

Shadow mind and soul-essence pulled away from body, connected only by life-force.

János grabbed it and twisted, tearing.

Belial’s body fell lifeless in the street, and the Jagdsprinz reared in triumph and surged towards the demon’s soul, its body twining in smoky looping bonds around the demon’s soul until finally it opened its mouth and crashed down on it it, shredding it, devouring it. 

The Jagdsprinz untwined, shook its head, and looked over at him with a snort.

 **Thank you for your help,** it said. **But drop your anchors, before you pull yourself apart.**

János did, and slowly sank down to the ground, exhausted.

* * *

It wasn’t even half over yet and Nico was already very done with today. The universe needed to just stop for a little bit, take a break, and take the time to pull itself together.

Some strange woman had taken his place distracting the demon, and then _János_ turned up and tore it apart, and he’d _clearly_ missed something with Cassiel Navin because Arik had been covered in a sheen of greenish-yellow light as soon as the magical barrier had come down, his idiosyncratic magic healing him, and he was frantically checking on Emma Miccichelo who had Cassiel lying dead next to her-

Most of all, he didn’t feel like a Jäger; but the Jagdsprinz was right there.

His most vivid memory of the 2000s, besides his first death, were the videos of the Hunt against Mephistopheles. This looked like that, but- condensed.

The shadow was so thick that it looked like you touch it, and the only thing visible within it was-

Nico didn’t know how to think of this, because Nia _was_ the Jagdsprinz, and yet the power around her wasn’t her. She was the only thing visible within that great monstrous form, but they moved _together._ He didn’t _think_ it was a possession, but it also didn’t seem like Nia was the one who had business here.

But that power was definitely the Hunt, the feeling of the Jagdsprinz’s power.

It was worrying him a little bit, because he’d never heard even a _hint_ about things working like this before. Ly Erg and Lord Hiruz and the Kaschieyivna sisters had talked about when Erlkönig’s Hunt had fallen. They hadn’t had a Jagdsprinz to hold the power, but they hadn’t _stopped_ being Jäger.

Right now, he wasn’t Jäger, and neither was anyone else.

Nico glanced over at Odette, trying to gauge her reaction. She looked just as lost as he felt, and was doing a better job of hiding her concern.

Isolde and Michele, whom he’d woken up next to- not so much. Isolde was staring at Nia like she’d _died_ or something, and Michele had whimpered _“Elti?”_ just once before wrapping his arms around himself and sniffing, trying not to cry.

“The fuck is this!” South Italy burst out, using both of his hands to point at the Jagdsprinz. _“The **fuck** is **this!** _ That’s **_Nia!_** ”

“Shut _up,_ ” Dietrich bit out, through his clenched teeth. He was hunched forward, head buried his knees. “ _God,_ I feel like I’m going to be sick-”

“ _What the fuck,_ Nico!”

Spain reached over blindly, on habit, and clapped his husband on the shoulder.

“You have to be polite to the children,” he said; and Nico almost wanted to laugh, because he’d forgotten that _Papá_ did that but it was so nice to hear it again.

“It’s going to be okay, _Padre_ ,” he told his father, even though he wasn’t totally sure that was true.

As he watched, the strange woman who had taken over demon-distracting duty straightened herself up to her full height, squared her shoulders, and gave the Jagdsprinz a _look._

“I am no witch,” she announced loudly.

That was an extremely unreassuring statement.

**You should not be here, Ahes Queen of Kêr-Is.**

_This_ was why the universe needed to go sit down and take a break. _This_ was not okay.

“Well, I _am,_ Jagdsprinz,” Ahes said. “And someone has _slandered_ me- I was told that in two days from my proper time I will be killed for acts of witchcraft I don’t even know how to commit, and that would be impossible for me to learn in that time. I deserve an explanation!”

The Jagdsprinz snorted, and stamped a hoof.

 **I do as well,** it replied. **All that is truth, and I have no answers for you.**

“You will know them when you return,” someone said, and Nico flinched. Those words held a promise he didn’t like, and timbre of _‘deep’_ and _‘cold’_ that he’d like to avoid.

He looked over his shoulder and found yet _another_ woman he didn’t know, this one wrapped in a long, tasseled, mostly red shawl, and wearing pounds of gold jewelry. Her eyes-

Nico saw her eyes and didn’t need anyone to tell him who this was. Nia didn’t talk about Ereshkigal often, but it had made an impression the times she did.

**Ah. You have required words from me for too long, Ereshkigal, Queen of Irkalla.**

Ereshkigal’s eyes widened, just a fraction; and Nico might not feel Jäger right now but he knew Honalenier and everyone had just gone very, very still.

 **You, Ereshkigal,** the Jagdsprinz continued. **I name derelict in duty and meddler and conniver and LIAR.**


	9. Blood and Fire

It was a moment before Ereshkigal spoke- a long, quiet one, where the two Kings stared each other down and everyone else waited for what the next words would be.

“You cannot exist,” Ereshkigal said, eventually. “Not like this. This is not what you were made for and not how I designed you-”

 **My bones you fashioned from the nothingness-chaos beyond creation,** the Jagdsprinz replied. **You bound me to the magic of the universe. I am given shape and form and power from the blood and deaths of those Hunted, and the Jäger who fall in my service- _all_ Jäger. I have part of the Knights of Erlkönig’s Hunt. I have part of Erlkönig. I was given a _mind_ when the demon Mephistopheles came to the Jagdshall; as unicorns gain theirs from the stealing of souls. It was a searching mind, a mind too loosely bound to the other parts that were firmly tied together; but it was anchored in the sole five remaining Jäger. _Five,_ Ereshkigal Queen of Irkalla;Arion, Ly Erg ap Gwyn, Zvezda and Zorya Kascheiyivna, Boreas- and lacked only a life-force to bind all together. You _designed_ me to be mindless and lifeless, a _thing_ to be used and controlled, and a means to control others. **

It took one firm, menacing step closer, to loom over Ereshkigal. She had to look up to see its face.

**Then you gave me Teufelmördor. Teufelmördor is _fire._ I _lived,_ stretched across too many souls to properly act, and then I was ripped out, away. I was _freed._**

**And now there is _judgement_ to be had.**

* * *

As far as Domdruc could tell, the worst physical injury Edward Kirkland-Héderváry had sustained was hitting his head on the floor. It hurt, but it probably wasn’t a concussion.

He made a list of things to do in his head as he checked the man over.

One- move the dead bodies. The human Kings seemed to be taking charge of their children’s shock at witnessing murder, which meant he didn’t have to try _that_. He’d have to ask General Héderváry to ask _Razanás Yisrā’el_ to get some people together to move the bodies.

Two- on one hand, _Razanás_ Amphitrite Kataiis and _Razanás_ Kore Despoina and Arion had gotten up when the human Kings did, and _Razanás_ Despoina had taken General Héderváry aside to check them over; but on the other hand, _Razanás_ Kataiis was _looking_ at the Jagdsprinz’s siblings and father with an expression Dom couldn’t quite parse, and it was making him nervous. So he had to come up with some sort of plan to keep _that_ mess from happening until someone capable of mitigating the damage was around. Someone like Marschall Braginski, maybe.

Three- get everyone together and take them _out_ of the Governor’s Residence the way he and Emma had come in. Or this and _‘moving the bodies’_ could switch, because removing the civilian _Seelenkind_ from the situation accomplished the same objective of keeping them as psychologically undamaged as they could be, given the situation.

Four- find Emma and Rosario. He had a dreadful twist in his gut about this one, because they’d found so many _Seelenkind_ and _Razanásan,_ but not Rosario; and Emma had gone after _Cassiel Navin._

Dom never got to five, because before he could think of anything else the magic came back.

 _He_ relaxed, and under his hands Edward Kirkland-Héderváry lost some of his tension, and Arion disappeared through the World Gate in a clatter of hooves, off to the Jagdsprinz- but two of the _Seelenkind_ suddenly collapsed into panic and he didn’t know _why._

 _Razanás_ Kataiis immediately went to one of them, so that must have been the Jagdsprinz’s sister. The woman tried to shove her away, kick at her, and her father wrapped his arms around her and pulled her back, trying to put himself between his daughter and _Razanás_ Kataiis.

 _“You,”_ Dom heard, and looked towards the sound to see one of the other _Razanásan_ , an old one he didn’t recognize, bearing down on him with a pointed finger. _“What is hurting my brother’s daughter.”_

It took another second to recognize and process through the out-of-date, accented Rinnrdrusk.

“Your name, _maghvát Razanás_?” he asked carefully, with a little bow. The human Kings generally cared less about formality than a Court in Honalee did, but there was still protocol, and he had no idea who this was.

Asking also gave him a reason to not give an answer he didn’t have.

The manners tripped up the human King a little. If he knew enough Rinnrdrusk to be able to communicate, he knew about the etiquette- and he probably hadn’t been expecting it here.  

“Eiliv Brynjarsson, the Kingdom of Norway, _Razanás Norge_ ,” the human King snapped back. _“My brother’s daughter.”_

“ _Maghvát Razanás Norge-_ ”

_“Really?”_

Domdruc stopped himself, and looked cautiously over at General Héderváry, who was staring at both of them.

“ _You_ know _Rinnrdrusk?_ ” they asked _Razanás Norge,_ sounding vaguely disgusted for some reason.

 _Razanás Norge_ looked at them suspiciously for a moment before answering.

“Of _course_ I know Rinnrdrusk. Ásdís-”

“It’s the magic, there’s too much of it, they’re not used to it,” General Héderváry interrupted him, gesturing to the one _Razanás_ Kataiis was trying to help. “Depending how long they’re here they might get used to it; the humans who are born nowadays get enough exposure before they’re born for it not to bother them once they _are_ born. It’s been centuries since we’ve had this sort of problem.”

“Well you’re going to _do_ something about it-”

“The kit you brought, Kommandant Filfaraskind.”

Dom went and fetched it for General Héderváry, carefully avoiding Joseph Kirkland-Héderváry’s body.

“Grab the General and _Razanás Yisrā’el_ ,” they told him when he handed over the kit. “Get them to start pulling everyone together. We’ll be safer _out_ of here when Cassiel Navin comes back.”

He hadn’t even _thought_ about the witch coming back, and now that he had he didn’t like it; so of course the universe decided that _then_ was the best time to throw in the next complication.

 _Razanás Venexia_ , feeling one of her children in distress, appeared right next to her daughter and came face-to-face with her lost husband.

* * *

Amphitrite moved as soon as Gisela went down curled up on herself and shaking and terrified, clutching at her father; a few unpleasant facts slotting into place.

Her spouse’s eldest was fully human; and yet she’d gone to Cassiel Navin and walked through Honalee. For the old humans, that was an accomplishment that shouldn’t be taken lightly. Nia and Heinrich had had full-Nation _Seelenkind_ blood to respond to the magic- Gisela, coming into Honalee, had had the example her cousin Cato in the House in Martigny to tell her what happened to humans around magic, and some forced exposure to Cassiel Navin while he worked. Yet she’d walked about Honalee without any of the magic-dampening charms that had been worked into the products of Cassiel Navin’s company, or that were given to human visitors to the Hunt’s territories in the later years.

It took a certain sort of stubbornness and determination to push through that; and after Amphitrite had come to know Feliciano’s children as well as they’d let her, she’d stopped being surprised. _All_ of the Beilschmidts were like that, though it showed differently in each of them.

That Gisela was panicking _now_ told her something she didn’t much like- she hadn’t been in the demon house in Martigny yet. None of these three- Gisela, Heinrich, Ludwig- had even _touched_ the beginnings of their family dissolving.

She kept one eye on Ludwig as Gisela tried to simultaneously kick her away and scramble backwards into her father’s arms and protection. It was easier to see the differences between him and Dietrich now that she had a _person_ to observe, and not some photographs and a few videos. He had a very different air about him.

Dietrich was sharp. He’d calmed some with age; but he still had a biting tongue and low tolerance for people he didn’t like, which didn’t always go well with his hard-headed insistence on being vocal about things he didn’t approve of or agree with. And he was… _bright,_ in the way the new Nations were, like a new knife or recently-polished silver. The world had never worn him down.

The world had definitely worn Ludwig down. She knew the details from Feliciano, but even without that, she would have been able to tell. He _felt_ old, in a way Dietrich didn’t and even in a way the other old Nations never had to her.

The new Nations were bright because the world had never worn them down. The old Nations had been battered about and the iron hearts and fire souls that kept them going through it all only went unnoticed because they were so good at hiding them, and biding their time, only to flare up unexpectedly at the right moment.

She wasn’t sure that Ludwig had that fire, even banked and waiting. There was bright, there was battered, and then there was ground down. Some of it other people had done to him but most of it Feliciano had told her that he’d done to himself; and Amphitrite quietly pushed away a stray thought that said _there’s no fire there it’s all stone against the sea I see why the demon picked him he’s so steady he’d either never be moved until he eroded all away or he’d break down his fault lines._

Feliciano was bound to be one of those fault lines- and given how strongly her spouse felt about this man?

 _I will not break him,_ Amphitrite promised herself, shifting aside slightly as she heard her grandchild call for a magic kit, preparing a space for them to slip into to treat Gisela. _And I will not break Feliciano. If truth doesn’t destroy love and need, we will make this work._

Upon reflection, a few seconds later, it was obvious that Feliciano would respond to Gisela’s distress by coming to her. A child terrified out of her wits, and one who’d died centuries ago? There really was no other possibility.

She reached for her spouse even before Feliciano froze, wide-eyed, at the sight of her lost husband.

“Breathe, _ileskos,_ ” Amphitrite told her quietly, a hand resting on her arm to keep her grounded.

Ludwig, expression gone relieved and open and _wanting,_ reached as well.

“ _Spatzi-_ ”

Amphitrite felt the moment that Feliciano’s breath hitched, betraying the change from blank surprise to-

“Don’t _touch me!_ ” Feliciano burst out, word tinged with panic as she slapped Ludwig’s hands away.

 _He_ froze, now; and Amphitrite could see it in his eyes as shutters were thrown shut in his mind- hide the sudden pain, hide the confusion, the worry, everything else-

He pulled his hands back, keeping them open and doing it not _slowly_ but deliberately, but with obvious control; and her eyes narrowed as he _physically_ leaned back and drew slightly away from his daughter, betraying some of his inner turmoil with the tension in his frame and the little hints of nervousness and hurt.

She _knew_ what this was.

This was a _‘no-threat’_ display. This was giving someone scared skittish their place. This was backing down this was giving in- this was _submission._

He thought that Feliciano was _scared_ of him, and maybe scared for their children, since he’d moved just that little bit away from Gisela, and wasn’t looking at Heinrich and wasn’t making contact with Feliciano any longer, gaze trending down towards the floor.

Feliciano wasn’t looking at him. She was looking at _her,_ expression desperate and pleading.

_You wouldn’t._

Árpád knelt down in the space she’d cleared for them, reaching for Gisela’s wrist with a hastily-twisted cord of silver and bronze wire to put the conscious mind in charge of the instincts screaming _‘danger’_ , and Amphitrite stood and pulled her spouse aside.

She stood close to her, blocking her view of her lost family. Feliciano went just a little less tense.

“You would give him up for me,” Amphitrite said quietly.

“I was wrong,” Feliciano whispered back. “You were first and whatever happened to bring them here, I can’t- they have to go back. I can’t keep them. I hurt you.”

Like she wasn’t hurting herselfto say this- if Feliciano didn’t want to hurt _her,_ then she couldn’t hurt herself. It wasn’t _allowed._

“You love them,” Amphitrite said.

“I love my children,” her spouse said. “That’s- they’re my children. _Ludwig_ I-”

_You **would.**_

“Don’t you _dare_ try to promise me you will give him up now that he’s here,” Amphitrite told her. “Don’t you _dare._ ”

“Trita-”

_“No.”_

“I’m trying to-”

Feliciano was verging on tears. It had been a while since she’d seen her cry over Ludwig.

“I left you once I _abandoned_ you and I did it for him and now he’s here and I married you first and I’m trying to-”

“You still go to his grave every year,” Amphitrite cut her off. “You still wear his cross with your wedding rings strung on it. The only time I have seen you without it is in bed with me. Any words you say to promise me that you will give him up now that you can have him again will be _lies._ Almost seven centuries, and you have never _once_ tried to give him up. You will not do it now that he’s here. The first time, I did not know until it was already over. That was-”

She took a steadying breath.

“That hurt enough, that you wouldn’t come to me, to trust me with your feelings and trust that we could work with the situation _together_. But I will _not_ be lied to to my _face. Especially_ not by _you._ Not about _this!_ ”

Feliciano shrunk.

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t want apologies,” Amphitrite said. “I want you not to _lie._ Not to me. Not to your children. Not to your _husband._ ”

“He’s not-”

“Maybe by God, he isn’t. Maybe by all your old human laws, he isn’t. But you _vowed_ to him, twice over. By Honalee’s laws, the two of you are still married. I am married to you and you are also married to him and I will _not_ let you mess this up, Feliciano!”

She looked at her warily.

“But I broke my vows. To you. And mine to Ludwig were made in bad faith-”

“I will _shake_ you,” Amphitrite threatened. There was only so much exasperation she could tolerate with her spouse. “It was _underhanded_ and you _lied_ but you _meant it_ when you promised _me_ and when you promised _him_ so _none of it_ was in bad faith and I have been _telling you_ these things for _centuries!_ ”

“I-”

“The Jagdsprinz cannot be wrong and does not lie,” Amphitrite told her firmly. “But _Nia_ can. And you _know_ which one has said which things. If you wish to pay your debts and lay your shame to rest- _tell them._ ”

Feliciano blanched.

“He’ll _hate me,_ ” she whispered, and started to tremble. Amphitrite squeezed her arm, trying to give her something to brace against. “Trita, he’ll _hate me._ ”

“He has the right to if he so wishes,” she said. “But were you even _looking_ at him?”

Feliciano looked at her a moment, fear and confusion warring in her eyes.

“…maybe?” she ventured.

Amphitrite sighed out her nose.

“You _hurt_ him, _ileskos_ ,” she said. “You saw him and were scared, not happy. It _hit him_.”

She poked Feliciano in the chest.

“ _Here._ He reacted to show _submission._ To signal that he was not a _threat._ He thinks that you are scared of _him,_ not of the truth you have to tell him.”

“I _can’t_ tell him. I _can’t,_ I-”

“You will have to,” she said. “Now, at least, is not a good time to discuss it. But you should tell him you love him.”

“It will just hurt him when he finally finds out,” Feliciano protested. “If I- I shouldn’t. It wouldn’t be fair of me to lead him on and even if he _doesn’t_ hate me when he finds out he won’t- I’ll lose him _anyway,_ Trita; he’ll stay away because you were first so I just shouldn’t- I should stay away. It-”

“Oh no,” Amphitrite said grimly. “ _Oh_ no. I will _not_ stand for any _emotional melodrama._ ”

Feliciano tried to grab her sleeve as she walked away, but she batted aside her hand.

“If _you_ won’t tell him,” she said. “ _I_ will.”

“ _Trita!_ Trita- no, _please-!_ ”

The other old Nations were staring. She doubted that any of them knew Thálassian, so it wasn’t because they’d been eavesdropping- but none of them would know that they were married, or why someone like _North Italy_ would be pleading with _her,_ the Queen of All Waters and Empress of Póli Thálassas.

France actually crossed himself when she looked at him, and she resisted the automatic urge to demand an apology. That was _rude;_ but she had something more important to do at the moment.

General Beilschmidt had swooped in on his brother since she had taken Feliciano away, and his furiously-protective scowl as she approached promised a bloody drag-on fight, King of Honalee who could take him apart with a thought and a look or no.

“I’m not here to steal him from you, General,” she told him in Farsuá, and mentally changed gears to old Italian as she looked at Ludwig.

“Feliciano isn’t scared of you,” Amphitrite informed him. “She’s terrified that she’ll _lose_ you, in a way she didn’t before. Once she tells you what she must- well. You will be completely within your rights to leave. But _never_ think that she has _ever,_ even _once,_ not loved you desperately and was not willing to pay any number of unadvisable prices, if it would bring you back.”

Ludwig stared at her for a long moment, as did his children. Amphitrite simply stood there, waiting for a question.

“…Excuse me?” Ludwig finally said; and she tilted her head, thinking.

“Trita,” she heard Feliciano say, and looked back over her shoulder at her. The desperate pleading expression was back.

Well- why _not?_ It would prevent the majority of potential expressions of emotional melodrama; both from her spouse and from the rest of the family.

Amphitrite looked back at Ludwig, and locked eyes with him.

“This will mean nothing to you,” she told him. “But I am Amphitrite Kataiis, Empress of Póli Thálassas, Queen of All Waters, Lady of the Second Republic of Venice-”

“ _Wait_ a minute-”

Without breaking her eye contact, Amphitrite pointed a finger in the direction of the voice.

“Do not interrupt me, Heinrich Costa,” she said. “I am _Razanás_ Amphitrite Kataiis, Mother of Horses, most senior of the Kings of Honalee and third in rank behind Ereshkigal King-maker and the Jagdsprinz. I was fully grown before life on Earth had left the water. I am the _Sea._ I stood on the first shoreline of your planet’s first ocean and felt the heat of volcanic rock under my feet as it cooled. I will be watching when your sun begins to die and your water boils away, for Honalee is _eternal._

And _you,_ Ludwig Beilschmidt King Germany, I name holder of kinright. Be welcome in my home, sheltered by my people, and protected under my name.”

* * *

He had had it up to _here_ with Honalee and Kings and the Hunt and how _dare_ Gilbert just _leave_ once Amphitrite Kataiis had said- _that!_

Germany was _looking_ at him like he expected an explanation from _him;_ and Gilbert, this was _not_ how you treated your friends!

Francis tried to be a little reasonable. Israel _had_ called him away, and they did seem to be legitimately busy-

But he was _not_ the person to explain this.

If only Arthur was in the proper state to handle this.

He wasn’t, so Francis looked beseechingly at Roderich, instead.

Roderich shook his head, just a little; but he and Erzsébet exchanged a look and she grabbed Japan while he went to corral the children and prod Norway over to join the explanation.

Good- this would be a Nations’ discussion.

“What was _that?_ ” Germany demanded once they’d all gathered around him.

 _“Honalee,”_ Francis growled. “This is why we _stay away_ from them!”

“Will someone _tell me_ what’s going on!”

 _“Gilbert,”_ Francis said, looking at Erzsébet and the others. “ _Neglected_ to inform his brother about magic or Honalee.”

Erzsébet’s scowl and muttered insults under her breath were a welcome balm; especially paired with Norway’s best forced-neutral expression that meant he was _judging_ you behind the façade, and Japan’s quiet sigh.

 _“Why,”_ Erzsébet said. _“Why.”_

“How important is this?” Germany asked, looking irritated. “The only time it’s ever come up is with demons!”

Well- that was true, at least. By the time Germany had come around, Europe had been staring down the first stages of the Industrial Revolution. He hadn’t grown up with it present and threatening, like the rest of them.

“Important enough that you should have been told even if it never affected you,” Erzsébet told him. “You at least know Grimm, right? You know your mythology?”

“Of _course_ I know the Brothers Grimm, Erzsébet! They’re cultural heritage! But _which_ mythology?”

“The mythology isn’t as important,” Norway said. “You’ll trip yourself up if you rely on it. But you know your folklore? Fairies? Nature spirits?”

“What, like…”

Germany spent a moment trying to think of something.

“The Lorelei? Kobolds?”

“Yes, like that,” Erzsébet said.

“If you’re going to tell me that’s it’s all true-”

“It’s not,” Norway cut him off. “Some of it is partially true, but the important thing is that you have a basis for it. Some sort of framework for thinking about things.”

“Ludwig,” Japan said. “It is like fantasy books, with parallel worlds. There are certain points on Earth where you can cross to Honalee, if you know what you are doing.”

“And that’s where magic is.”

“No,” Norway said. “Magic is everywhere. But there are very few people who can use it here.”

“Honalee is broken up into Kingdoms,” Erzsébet continued. “They each have a King. A _Razanás._ It’s- sort of a divine right of kings system. A _Razanás_ has total power over their Kingdom. There’s the Steppes under Möngkedai Khan, Lanka Kubera under King Rāvaṇa, Lintukoto under Seppo Ilmarinen, Buyan under Kaschei Perun-”

“Kūnlún under Xī Wángmŭ,” Japan added. “Chicomoztoc under… I do not know who, they change often. Hawaiki, though I have only ever heard the name of the place and not of their King.”

“King Andvari for the Mountains East and West,” Norway said. “Ereshkigal for Irkalla. The Jagdsprinz for the Jägerskov. Amphitrite Kataiis for Póli Thálassas. Kore Despoina for Orcus-”

 _“Morningtown,”_ Francis scowled. “Queen Nicnevin for the Silent Hills. Ahes for Kêr-Is-”

“No, she’s dead,” Erzsébet told him. “Witchcraft.”

“There are other important people,” Norway said, picking back up from where he’d been interrupted. “Some of them hold the title of _‘King’_ without being a _Razanás._ But _Razanásan_ are like… extremely powerful sorcerers. You _do not cross_ a _Razanás_ , especially the higher they rank in relation to the others.”

“Ludwig,” Japan said. “You heard what Amphitrite Kataiis said. She is one of the oldest, most powerful, and most respected of the Kings of Honalee. And she has granted you kinright.”

Germany was wearing his _‘this meeting is not proceeding in an orderly fashion’_ frown.

“I’m not related to her,” he said. “I’ve never met her before. I know she _existed_ five minutes ago.”

“It is… somewhat troubling,” Japan allowed.

“She _wants_ something from you,” Francis told his neighbor. “Or she’s trying to get something and you’re a means to an end. Honalee doesn’t _care_ about humans. Nations are tolerated. They think of us as something like lesser Kings. But they don’t _care_ about us. We don’t _matter_ to them.”

“I think that’s just you, Francis,” Erzsébet said. “I don’t really know Möngkedai Khan, but the people of the Steppes have always welcomed me. And Seppo Ilmarinen knows me.”

“And _I_ happen to be friends with the King of the Trolls, and welcomed by the Dvergr,” Norway said.

 _“Tylwyth Teg,”_ Francis told them. “The _Hunt._ ”

Erzsébet winced a little.

“What?” Germany asked.

“He’s got some unfortunate neighbors, Ludwig,” she told him. “Honalee isn’t really a… _nice_ place. There are nice _spots_ and nice _people,_ but the overall culture is more- well, _‘feudal’_ isn’t the right word, but-”   

 “They’re vicious and territorial and unforgiving and manipulative!”

“If Amphitrite Kataiis knows Italian she might know German,” Erzsébet said. “So maybe you should try being more polite, Francis. And maybe think about your prejudices while you’re at it. _We_ used to live like that.”

“It’s better _now;_ and not with _magic_ we didn’t!”

“Which is _why_ they’re so unforgiving when the rules are broken!” Norway snapped at him. “Why do _we_ have rules about what we do as Nations and how we treat other Nations, Francis? It’s to keep revenge and retribution from getting out of hand! It’s to _protect ourselves_ so that we don’t come at each other with _personal_ grudges! Everyone in Honalee can do at least a little magic. You _have_ to have strict structures and customs so people don’t _massacre_ each other because- because a storm spirit and an oread got drunk and someone got insulted and they leveled an entire street having it out with each other!”

“Or some gerekh get mad at each other, and their sündeyalacgh and zayaacgh start attacking the people in the other gerekh,” Erzsébet said. “Or some feuding sorcerers catch people in the crossfire of a feud.”

“The Yóuxiá in the Lower Reaches of Kūnlún,” Japan added. “Many of them are sword-sorcerers, and they can be relentless when they are crossed, or the people they have promised to protect- but there are rules about how and when revenge can be taken, what warrants what. There _must_ be, to keep things from becoming a cycle of violence.”

“Think about how often you get annoyed with people,” Norway said. “And how often you wish something bad would happen to someone. Now imagine that every time that happened you could curse them; or every time someone thought that of you, they could be cursing _you._ Collectivist social bonds make it so it would be one person against a family or a clan or a group of friends or allies, not one person against another person, so people are pressured out of flying off the handle. Social primacy is given to promises and vows and contracts and oaths, spoken and unspoken, written and implied, so that communities and order are maintained and there isn’t a _reason_ to fight in the first place! If people really _want_ tofight or get magic involved, or it’s too serious to let go- then there are duels, and the _Razanásan,_ and the Jagdsprinz.”     

“So kinright,” Germany said.

“What it sounds like,” Erzsébet told him. “She claimed you as family, at least as far as social relations go. If you get in trouble, she’s promised to come help you. If you need help, she’s obligated herself to give you the same assistance she’d give anyone else in her family. And she won’t hurt you. Not unless she’d hurt her family. If you’re not treated right by someone else, then it’s an offense to her as well. It’s… deterrent. It will keep people in Honalee from messing with you. I don’t know _why_ she did it, but she did. I guess she thought you’d need the protection.”

“But the demon is gone,” he said. “We’re Nations again. I can feel my people. There aren’t-”

He took a deep breath.

“-a lot of them,” he said. “But they _are_ there, and they don’t _feel_ like they’re in danger. Why would I need protection?”

The rest of them looked at each other.

“I have no idea,” Norway admitted. “And I hope we don’t find out. Francis isn’t _entirely_ wrong- things can go _very_ wrong, where Honalee is involved.”

* * *

Mosè hadn’t been expecting the Jagdsprinz to get up and walk away in the thrall of some sort of… spirit… thing.

Sometimes being a Jäger was weird.

But part of the job was to take things as they came, so he was going to let it go and leave the sorcerers to sort out. He had Regiments Jäger here to deal with, and the police that had been on the media cordon. The media themselves were mostly gone now, rushed around to the front of the building to capture whatever was going on there.

Right now, the most important thing was deciding what to do with the children. Sure, their mother was out front, and the rest of High Command-

But the spirit thing was out there now. _Tante_ Nia was with it and _somehow,_ he didn’t know how, he knew it was the Jagdsprinz, yeah- but that seemed _big._ Dangerously big. The sort of thing you shouldn’t subject children to.

Not that he was going to call Maria and Sebastian children to their faces. They were twenty and legally adults, sure, but twenty was weird phase. Adult enough to mind being called a child, but not fully transitioned yet into the adult world.

But they were twenty and he was six hundred and ninety-six, so- children he was in charge of, because their parents weren’t here and they were his cousins.

The question was where was _‘safe’_? They had some place here in Kharad, but he didn’t know what sort of protections were in place there. Martigny was far away. There were Jäger here but there were only a couple and he had no idea what they were good at.

Mosè wasn’t going to _tell_ her, but it was a relief when Luisa appeared around the side of the Governor’s Residence. She wasn’t _running,_ but that quick walk was a familiar indication of _‘situation proceeding quickly to critical, don’t run and people might stay calm’_.

“You’re okay?” he asked as soon as she was within speaking distance.

“What?” his older sister asked, sounding vaguely distracted. “Oh- yeah. Arik and Emma showed up. Emma got Cassiel. Then János and the Jagdsprinz got the demon.”  

Of _course_ it had been Emma.

“And _‘got’_ means…”

“He’s dead.”

Mosè had to give himself a minute for that one.

“But she’s not even-” he started to say, then realized how it sounded and switched. “Is _she_ okay?”

“I don’t know,” Luisa said. “I don’t know. He got her with the big _Drakräder_ knife in the gut and it was a minute or two before anyone got to her and the sorcerers were all distracted but I _guess_ someone got her to one of the field medics or a hospital. I didn’t see, I wasn’t looking-”

“What _is_ going on out there?” he asked.

“Is _Elti_ okay?” Maria wanted to know, and Mosè frowned at her a little. She was _supposed_ to be letting the other Jäger watch her.

But since when did his cousins do _that?_

Sebastian had one hand clenched in her sleeve, and once he’d noticed that, he took a second look. Maria looked- shaken up.

“Are _you_ okay?” he asked his cousin. He still wasn’t totally sure _what_ they’d done to get _Tante_ Nia back- well, it was _sort_ of _Tante_ \- but if they’d finally overextended themselves or gone somewhere they shouldn’t have-

He felt Luisa stiffen beside him, probably because she’d had the same thought, and he didn’t blame her. He didn’t really want to think about that happening. The thing with Nadri had been much too close to witchcraft for comfort. There were _rules_ about souls for a reason; and they’d only avoided it because they’d _rearranged_ her soul, not taken parts out of it.

It had still been close. _Tante_ Nia hadn’t told the children- actually, he wasn’t sure if she’d even told her wife or _Nonna_ Feli- but that first afternoon, once the children had been dragged back to Martigny and the doctors and János were poking at Nadri to make sure she was okay-

 _Tante_ Nia had put him and Nico and Marschall Braginski in a room, and told them to go over Honalenier law and precedent with a fine-toothed comb to make _sure_ they hadn’t somehow ended up in witchcraft.

“The, uh,” Sebastian said. “We went to find the Jagdsprinz and _I_ was scared until it told me- well it sort of said anything I’ve done wrong was beneath its notice. But it _yelled_ at Maria.”

Mosè hadn’t ever been on the wrong end of _Tante_ Nia yelling at someone while she was being Jagdsprinz. But he’d seen some, and he remembered how scared Luisa had been when _Tante_ Nia had dragged her home to Venice and made her tell them how she’d gotten herself stuck in the Hunt. Getting yelled at by that spirit-Jagdsprinz was probably a lot worse.

“It told us we weren’t meant to _exist,_ ” Maria said.

Well, he didn’t know how to respond to _that._ That was far outside his scope of responsibilities, or even understanding. But being yelled at by the Jagdsprinz-

“Why did you get yelled at?” Luisa asked, before he could.

Maria looked at them, clearly ready to burst into tears at any second, and…

She was scared.

It was the same scared Mosè had seen during the times when things were bad enough or complicated enough in the field that the Hunt needed lawyers on site. Usually the Jagdsprinz was there, too- and _that’s_ who he was used to people looking at like this.

His heart sunk to the vicinity of his stomach.

“Maria…”

“It’s _my_ fault,” she whispered. “We’d gotten out and I took us somewhere safe I know and we thought it would be a good idea to summon the Jagdsprinz so we _did_ but I didn’t- I didn’t- I never ever thought and no one _told me-_ ”

“Maria, uh,” Sebastian picked up for his sister. “See- she can go _anywhere,_ right? So one time when we were little she thought she’d aim for _‘as far as I can’_ rather than an actual _place,_ and she sort of- there’s an _‘outside’_ to the universe, to reality, and she ended up there except she didn’t know because there was this _thing_ with the stardust and we didn’t know until the Jagdsprinz told us but she created an entire new universe.”

“I wasn’t _trying_ to!” Maria cried. “I was _seven_ I was just _exploring-_ ”

“So that safe place was in this other universe,” Sebastian continued. “And between the two is- there’s not a good way to describe it but it’s _not reality_ and it turns out that’s a lot of what the Jagdsprinz is made up of, at its core, so when we tried to summon it from that other universeit got stuck in-between in that not-reality. So we got back _here_ and Maria couldn’t find _Elti_ but when I went walking I saw that there were cracks to the not-reality so I took Maria because I thought she could fix it- she knows a _lot_ about the not-reality, she’s spent a lot of time looking at it and going in and out- and she could figure out where _Elti_ was from there and pulled us into the not-reality and that was where the Jagdsprinz was and then we showed it how to get back-”

“You,” Luisa cut him off, sounding aghast and a little outraged.

At least _she_ was able to make words. Mosè was still working on coherent thought. Right now, he was stuck in a wordless feeling of dread.

“You _created_ an entire _universe._ ”

“It’s a _little_ universe?” Sebastian offered. “You can walk across it in less than an hour.”

“An entire _universe!_ ” Luisa burst out, outrage winning in her tone. “You can’t just- _do that!_ ”

“I _know,_ I _know!_ ” Maria told her. “I didn’t _know!_ ”

“And the Jagdsprinz was mad at _me_ when I-”

Luisa stopped suddenly, and looked quietly horrified. She opened her mouth slightly, but didn’t seem to be able to go any farther.

“The Hunt,” Mosè said, forcing himself to speak. “You broke the Hunt. The universe- magic- you didn’t-”

Take a breathe. Fight the urge to throw up. Try to ignore the heartbreak.

“You _broke_ the _Hunt,_ ” he repeated. “You broke the _Jagdsprinz._ That’s-”

 It wasn’t anything _officially-_ he knew, he was a lawyer. He was the longest-practicing lawyer in the galaxy. He _knew_ his law.

And he knew the reason that there wasn’t anything explicit in any law- in the _Jagdsprinz’s Pact-_ was because no one had ever thought that this would happen.

That it _could_ happen.

Even if it wasn’t in the law codes, that could only be- that _had to_ be-

“Witchcraft.”

* * *

One thing Árpád had never done in all the years they’d been alive was run an evacuation in the midst of a disaster. They were pretty happy they’d never have to do that, but it could have been helpful in this case. They felt guilty about leaving England to haul his daughter away from Lana and not doing it themself; but the only way they could think to do it made them feel callous inside.

They were really leaning on the General and Israel for this, because no matter what Arik had said, Zell Beilschmidt and Øystein Brynjarsson weren’t really the best people for this. Not when the Nations were back. The General and Israel were, well, _mean_ enough to threaten to physically drag the humans out of the room if they didn’t keep themselves together and have people believe that they would.

Even if the General was really distracted with his daughter and his brother. And the old Nations still weren’t sure what to do with Amphitrite’s declaration and the little argument she and Venice had had.

But the old Nations would listen to the General and Israel, and the old _Seelenkind_ would listen to the old Nations; so it was working out. Mostly.

Árpád took point out of the room, Amphitrite sweeping along just behind them and her daughter just past that. Domdruc was on their rear, and the other Nations strung out along the line, sticking close to the humans

“I know you want to ask,” Amphitrite said as they reached the stairs.

“Kinright for Germany, Grandmother?”

“Think it through,” she said.

“Germany doesn’t need any protection,” they said. “Not like _that._ The Jagdsprinz is his daughter. So even besides not wanting to get mixed up in the time-travel and risking breaking the universe, no one would _dare_ touch him. _And_ he’s the General’s his brother. And maybe Venice is complicated, but your spouse wouldn’t let anyone hurt him if she could stop it. _And_ he’s _Razanás._ His children wouldn’t need it, either. They’re too well-connected. The Nations might need it- France has been really rude. And I sort of got the idea that England might be more magically-practiced than the others, but I’m pretty sure that he didn’t really have _friends._ If Ly Erg was still alive, _he’d_ owe him. Maybe Odette would take it up?”

“You’ve talked past the point, Árpád,” their grandmother told them, tone amused.

Now why would she be amused?

“Is this supposed to be a joke?” they asked. “I don’t see how it would be funny. Just sort of strange- he could sort-of claim kinright from you _anyway._ Venice would owe it, at least a little, and you two are married so it’s a claim.”

“Closer,” she said. “But _think,_ child- who could Germany claim kinright from?”

“The Jagdsprinz,” Árpád said immediately. “And the General. Like I said, I don’t know if Venice would _have_ to count but she’d give it anyway if she asked. Though if the Jagdsprinz was _really_ angry she might-”

 _“Grandmother,”_ Árpád said. “That was _sneaky._ I don’t think the Jagdsprinz is going to be very happy once she figures this out.”

“The Jagdsprinz,” Amphitrite said. “Cannot revoke my offer. Germany would have to refuse it himself, and once he knows _why_ I’ve given it, I would be surprised if he did.”

“Still,” Árpád said, and tried to imagine just _how_ upset everyone would be about this.

The Jagdsprinz and the General had disowned themselves of Venice a long time ago, and each other starting even before that. They both had a claim on Germany through kinright, so they were still _sort of_ family that way- but neither of them would stand the other, or Venice approaching Germany again. There would be fighting, as soon as everything had settled down a bit.

They could insult and fight each other without impunity- they’d been doing it for _centuries_ already. But if _Grandmother_ was _also_ his family-

Then Germany had a legal in to Venice. And making _him_ upset, or hurting him, reflected back onto Amphitrite. The General couldn’t offend her like that. Venice was _married_ to her, and Árpád didn’t know her _that_ well, but _Nagymama_ had always said that Venice avoiding fighting if she could, or if she hadn’t gotten really really angry.

And the Jagdsprinz was the _Jagdsprinz._ She’d keep the law and the social structures because she _was_ them. Fighting with her family wasn’t a good enough reason to break anything. All three of them would _have_ to try to be nice to each other about Germany. They probably wouldn’t succeed; but they couldn’t just go straight to being vicious. They had to _try._

“They’ll probably still fight,” Árpád told their grandmother, once everyone had gotten off the stairs and was accounted for again.

“Oh, I’m certain there will be screaming,” Amphitrite said. “Name-calling. The Jagdsprinz and the General may actually finally hit each other. But they will _not_ be able to use Germany as a playing-piece in their family feud. And Feliciano will _not_ be able to avoid him.”

Venice had _actually considered_ that?

Well- _that_ was something the Jagdsprinz wasn’t going to hear about. At least not from _them._

Árpád had to leave the family politics to rest for the moment, because now that they were back on the ground floor, things were more dangerous. Sure, they had magic now- but Cassiel Navin was probably still out there, and who _knew_ what sort of trouble he’d been able to kick up, or if he was lying in ambush somewhere.

They went out to check the hallway with Domdruc before anyone else was let out of the state dining room.

“Front door’s open, General,” Domdruc told them. “And-”

He didn’t have to finish that thought. Árpád felt it, too; down through their bones and straining like horses eyeing a run. It was _calling._

Amphitrite ghosted past them, and Árpád had to shake themself to get in the right frame of mind to follow.

“ _Razanás_ Despoina-” they heard Domdruc say behind them, but that didn’t matter quite so much because they’d gotten close enough to the front door for most of the outside to be visible.

The front lawn was a bit of a mess. The demon was lying dead just beyond the fence, and a patch of grass was wet with blood, as well as a different area by the fence, by where Cassiel Navin was lying _dead_ with his brains and bits of skull sprayed across the lawn by a point-blank bullet-

And the _Jagdsprinz._

“Grandmother,” Árpád said quietly, eyes not leaving the great dark form of a monstrous stag surrounding the one they were _used_ to thinking of as Jagdsprinz.

“I don’t know,” she replied. “I have never-”

Árpád backed up enough to get back into the doorframe, and called: “Out the front, Kommandant!” to Domdruc.

 ** _I_ cannot judge _you,_ Ereshkigal Queen of Irkalla? **the Jagdsprinz asked, a bite in its tone; and Árpád just wanted to go find their father-

 _“Ereshkigal,”_ their grandmother said. “The Jagdsprinz is- _Ereshkigal._ ”

Their father was sitting down in the street past the broken gates of the Residence. Nico and Demyanev were with him, and some other people they didn’t recognize-

“ _Apa-_ ”

“Árpád,” their father said, relief cutting through the exhaustion. He reached for them, and they dropped down in front of him for a hug.

“You’re alright?” they asked, hugging him tightly. They knew some things about sündeyalacgh, but nothing they’d heard had ever suggested that something like what they’d seen a few minutes ago _-_ the single-minded detachment, the double shadow and physical state- was possible. It was probably a strange side effect of being _Seelenkind;_ but that didn’t mean it wasn’t dangerous or wouldn’t hurt him-

“I’m tired,” _Apa_ told them. “Wrung out. I just need some time.”

“Do you want _Nagymama_? _Nagyapa_? I could-”

“Wh-” Nico started to ask, then memory hit. “Wait _no. No-_ there _cannot_ be-”

“Hungary and Austria,” Árpád reported. “And Norway and Japan and England and France. And-”

He wasn’t going to like this last bit.

“Germany. And their children.”

 _“Shit!”_ they heard Nico exclaim.

 _“General,”_ Demyanev said sternly. Árpád imagined that he’d grabbed the back of his commanding officer’s coat to keep him from running off- they’d seen that happen a couple of times before. “ _You_ are _not_ the one in charge of damage control. You’ve been holding the demon off all day- let _Marschall Braginski_ handle the old Nations.”

 “They’re going to need _explaining_ to, Demyanev; and Marschall Braginski isn’t going to do it _carefully,_ or-”

“The _hell_ it matters how Russia explains this!” an unfamiliar voice exploded. “There is _no fucking good explanation for this!_ ”

Árpád shifted so they could see the other people in the group.

“ _Papà-_ ” Nico started to say; and oh dear- that was _nine_ old Nations.

“Demyanev,” they said, before the other Witchbreaker could try to get in between Nico and his parents. “Terenzia-”

“She’s fine,” he said. “She pulled Zannah Brahe out of the way and stepped off over by Odette, the demon never touched her- heads up, General-”

Árpád knew the sound of their wife’s steps, and stood up to meet her, and hug her back fiercely.

“You’re-” Terenzia said, tangling her hands in their hair.

“I’m alive,” Árpád told her. “I’m fine. Cassiel Navin was close, and whatever happened to knock us all out, but- I’m fine. Demyanev said-”

“The demon _just_ missed me- _Papà_ was holding the demon off but when the _thing_ happened he _died_ and he didn’t get back up and that was with _magic_ and _you_ weren’t-”

“ _Apa_ saved me I was safe the whole time.”

“I was so _scared._ ”

“I was kind of scared, too. What _did_ happen?”

“We don’t know,” Terenzia said. “But the full _Seelenkind_ died and didn’t get up and the _magic_ went all wrong and the Nations died and- and the _Hunt-_ stopped-”

“But the Hunt can’t-”

They’d missed it, before; the feeling of not being Jäger. They’d been _dying,_ and then there was trying to get everyone together to leave and their half-brother and his mother were dead-

Árpád’s hold on Terenzia tightened.

“We’re not…?”

“We’re _not,_ ” Terenzia said. “The Jagdsprinz is here, but we’re _not._ ”

“We _have_ to be,” Árpád protested, fear rising. “ _You_ have to be- if there’s no Hunt you’re _human-_ ”

“It will-” Terenzia tried to reassure them, but the words got stuck. After she swallowed, and managed to speak again, it was obvious she wasn’t convinced. “The Hunt will get fixed. Things will be right again. It’s the Hunt- we _have_ to have it and Ereshkigal’s here. She made it, she can fix it.”

* * *

Ivan didn’t _like_ how he felt without the Hunt. He could still feel his people, the human Jäger- and somewhere under all that dark stag, he could feel his Prince still- but it wasn’t the same as feeling _Jäger._ He felt uncomfortably unmoored, and uncertain.

And everything else was already such a disaster-

He hadn’t missed Domdruc leading the group out of the Governor’s Residence.

 _God hates us,_ was his first thought, seeing faces long-dead. It was hard not to be cynical and pessimistic, but the only upside he’d seen in _any_ of this so far was that Nia was too distracted to notice that her father and siblings were currently alive, and that Feliciano and Gilbert didn’t look like they’d tried to attack each other over Ludwig yet.

And Cassiel Navin was dead. And he was reasonably certain that Emma was going to live. He could _feel_ her now, and a little poking through the citizen-bond hadn’t yielded anything that felt like _‘dying’_.

So. There were a _few_ good things to happen from this.

But it was going to get worse, he was certain. Especially because the Jagdsprinz was tearing into Ereshkigal.

 **I was created to judge those of the universe,** the Jagdsprinz said. **_You_ are not exempt.**

“You should not exist-”

**No. What should not _exist_ are the children. Sebastian and Maria Beilschmidt. Tirreno and Nadri Costa Kataiis. **

_Sebastian_ and _Maria?_

Ivan looked around, and didn’t see them. Reno and Nadri were over with Odette, but-

If the Jagdsprinz said they weren’t meant to exist, and they weren’t _here-_ he didn’t like that. Not at all.

**I _saw_ what you told Nanshe, Ereshkigal. And I _saw_ what Nanshe did. **

“I only told her the truth as I was told it,” Ereshkigal said. “She is _owed_ for Ahes’s death; and it is Teufelmördor who owes her!”

Ivan bristled at the accusation, even as the Honalenier Jäger nearby murmured to each other in unease. That didn’t make _sense._

“Ahes _came_ to me,” Ereshkigal continued. “The day before Gwyn ap Llud went to Kêr-Is! _She_ told me-”

**“I have witnessed the future, and I shall be named _‘witch’_. It was not of my doing, but Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor’s. She will come to you on Arion son of Amphitrite Kataiis. Wait for her.” I remember how you told it, Ereshkigal. And I question _why_ you trusted it.**

“The future was _witnessed!_ I would not _destroy-_ ”

**You never called Erlkönig to verify her words! She came to you and claimed witchcraft, and yet you trusted her! You did not _question-_**

“The _future-_ ”

**DO NOT INTERRUPT ME.**

He would _not_ quail. He had faced tyrants and emperors and despots. He had fought a _demon._ He had ridden with the Hunt.

This was his Prince.

 **You have questioned nothing,** the Jagdsprinz said. **You have examined nothing. You told Nanshe Queen of the Ramman that her daughter Ahes had come to you and said that Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor, knowing full well that Nanshe had just learned of her death and was newly swamped by grief, was responsible for Ahes’s sentence by Erlkönig. You did not _think-_ or perhaps you did. I am not sure which would be worse.**

“Just _what_ are you accusing me of?”

**_Many_ things, Ereshkigal Queen of Irkalla. Most lately- and something that Nanshe _will_ answer for- the tampering with of King Andvari’s gift to a new Teufelmördor, a plot of revenge concocted with magic she has never fully understood. She put _stardust_ in potion meant to guarantee conception. Liesl Hohenheim _Razanás Liechtenstein_ shared half with Feliciano Costa _Razanás Venexia_ before she died.**

Stardust? That sounded familiar.

“No,” Ivan heard Lord Hiruz whisper, next to him. “No.”

“What?” he asked. “Those are the children, yes-”

 _“Stardust,_ ” Lord Hiruz said. “Was what the Sorcerer-Queen of Kêr-Is used for _her_ magics.”

 **There is only _one_ who fully understands the magic and power inherent in stars, and she was dead! **the Jagdsprinz snapped, stomping a hoof. **Four _children_ were given the power of creation, with none the wiser- and it took until _today_ for anyone to learn!**

Today- the children-

The Jagdsprinz, like this. _This_ was not normal-

**They have had no training! Ahes Queen of Kêr-Is had to _tell them-_ and _still_ they do not know everything! The power to _create-_ to _truly_ create! You, Ereshkigal, told Nanshe that Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor owed her a daughter; and Nanshe intended to steal one back! _Maria Beilschmidt was born as the Sun._**

No. No, they would have _noticed._ She would have _done_ something- except they _had_ done something. The impossible. Rearranging a soul.

**The _Sun,_ and the others with bits of star in them! Everyone thought nothing of it, simply young _Seelenkind_ who knew full well the power of magic- _ignorance_ and _thoughtlessness!_ All three to change the soul of fourth, a universe built without knowing-**

“A _universe,_ ” Ereshkigal cut over it. “A-”

You couldn’t just _make_ a universe; and you couldn’t- you _shouldn’t_ be able to without _knowingly_ doing it.

Ivan took it back. God _loved_ them. That was the only reason they could have survived this long.

“They are a _threat,_ Jagdsprinz!” the Queen of Irkalla shouted, so there was no one who couldn’t hear her. “A danger to Honalee! They _cannot_ be left free! I will _not_ have another _Seelenkind_ witch, an _uncontrolled_ child of Nations with magic-”

**You will not?**

“ _You know what they can do!_ For this to happen _again-_ they have the power of _Kings,_ power _beyond_ Kings, without the _controls_ on them- you are right, Jagdsprinz. They should not exist- they _must not_ exist.”

The children Ivan had seen grow up? _Nia’s_ children? The Princess of Póli Thálassas and his sister? They were- everyone had known they were _powerful,_ yes.

But what Ereshkigal was saying-

No Nation let their children go lightly; and Venice and Nia loved fiercely.

Ivan remembered how little Nia had wanted to put him and Mosè and Nico to searching legal precedent when the children were dragged out of the mountains. She had been so scared, and trying so hard to not be, that something would turn up. He’d felt the conflict of Jagdsprinz’s duty and a parent’s love, Nia being uncertain if she was more afraid that her children had learned to skirt and cheat the law so tightly or that they had fallen to witchcraft in the attempt to help and that her duty would make her put them to the sword.

He’d promised himself, that afternoon, that if anything came up, it wouldn’t be _her_ doing that.

He’d killed before. He’d killed people he’d known. He’d killed his own citizens. He knew that pain; and if there was an execution to be done, he would take the children’s blood on _his_ hands, gladly.

Nia was his Prince. He would protect her.

The Jagdsprinz still hadn’t spoken. It was looking down at Ereshkigal, head cocked slightly to the side, considering. Thinking something over.

Ivan didn’t think it was Nia’s conflict. This wasn’t Nia. She was working with it, but it wasn’t _her._ Sebastian and Maria weren’t its children.

 **How terrified you must have been of her,** the Jagdsprinz finally said; and Ivan looked over to Lord Hiruz to see if _he_ had any idea what that was supposed to mean.

It didn’t look like he did.

 **Nia,** the Jagdsprinz clarified. **When she came to Irkalla on Arion, matching the Teufelmördor Ahes had spoken of, claiming blood of two human Kings, so angry and with so much potential for power and with such a grievance in need of restitution. But she was no Gwyn ap Llud, who had lived his entire life in Honalee, trusting you and your word implicitly. _Bowing_ to you. **

_“I-”_

The great shadowy head leaned down, until its burning red eyes were only feet from Ereshkigal.

 **How _scared_ were you of her? **the Jagdsprinz asked. **She who, if she touched magic, would have power beyond Kings? This one who thought herself human, who could touch magic and never die? Who could touch magic and have the power to destroy a demon? Who could _have_ magic, magic enough to make her the equal of any King; but without the _controls,_ the _words_ and the _ideas_ you had given Honalee to make them rely on you? **

Ivan- he hadn’t thought of things like that before. Honalee claimed no gods but those the kidnapped humans had made; but how often had he heard of them speak of Ereshkigal as some sort of higher power? It wasn’t even uncommon for her to be _explicitly_ referred to as such. Anyone who could make Kings, create something like the Jagdsprinz- well, they _had_ to be, didn’t they?

Or did they?

The full-blooded _Seelenkind,_ after all, were so much like Nations. And _they_ had all thought themselves human, until it was proved that choosing magic changed them. Full-blooded, magic-using _Seelenkind_ got magic, functional immortality- all without the constraints that Nations had.

The Kings of Honalee who were still the first of their people and position- Amphitrite Kataiis, Xī Wángmŭ, Nanshe, Andvari, Kaschei Perun- had never denied that they had simply _been,_ had simply arose in their Kingdoms with a certain power already.

Now that he actually thought about it, he realized that _all_ they had ever said Ereshkigal had done was make them Kings. Not give them magic. Not grant them their long lives. Only- validate their authority. _Authenticate_ them.

 _But in whose eyes?_ old suspicion and cynicism asked. _Who did it matter to?_

The _other_ Kings of Honalee. The others Ereshkigal had gone to.

Ivan suddenly despised himself, with a viciousness he hadn’t had reason to feel in a long time. He’d- they’d even been _told this._ Every seasonal holiday and emergency meeting of the Irvinrdisganheid, Lord Hiruz had _told them._

_‘Under the rule of a King- a new one then, but a King nonetheless and therefore again safe under Ereshkigal.’_

Ereshkigal’s endorsement as a King of Honalee didn’t really mean that you had a leader or a ruler- the Domdruharc, the Jägerskov, had had one with the Irvinrdisganheid before the Hunt had even been an _idea._ They’d been hearing the story of it for _centuries._

Having a King just meant that you’d _bought into the system._

Or been _forced_ into it, like the Domdruc had been.

**How long had you thought of Nations as an unexpected side-effect of the Hunt, to be so shaken by being forced to truly knowthat they were every bit Kings of their people in their own lands as any King of Honalee? How _angry_ were you, Ereshkigal, to discover that by creating me you had created a whole group of Kings who had no loyalty to you, no reason to fear you; Kings you had _no hold over?_ How _easy_ was it to decide to deceive her into promising to go after the demon Mephistopheles? To send her and her siblings to the remnants of Erlkönig’s Hunt, who never questioned your authority and would hear her story and think, because they were of _Honalee_ through and through and trusted you as implicitly as Gwyn did, that she had bound herself to become Jagdsprinz and kill the demon; and perhaps herself and her siblings in the bargain, and keep these human Kings _away_ from Honalee, and the Kings and people you had groomed- the power you had _cultivated_?**

“She _promised,_ ” Ereshkigal hissed. “I did not _make her_ do so! She promised and so she was _bound_ -”

 **A CONTRACT CAN ONLY BE BETWEEN INFORMED PARTIES CAPABLE OF CONSENT,** the Jagdsprinz thundered. **NIA WAS HUMAN IN EVERY WAY THAT MATTERED. SHE. WAS. _UNINFORMED._ THERE WAS _NO CONTRACT._ SHE COULD HAVE _WALKED AWAY. YOU KNEW THIS._ YOU _DECEIVED HER_ AND _EXPLOITED_ ZORYA KASCHEIYIVNA AND LY ERG AP GWYN AND AMPHITRITE KATAIIS AND KASCHEI PERUN AND SEPPO ILMARINEN TO DO IT.**

“Amphitrite Kataiis was _owed!_ ” Ereshkigal yelled back. “The demon Mephistopheles-”

 **ANY FULL-BLOODED SEELENKIND SORCERER COULD HAVE KILLED THE DEMON MEPHISTOPHELES WITH SIMPLE KNOWLEDGE OF ITS CAPABILITIES AND THE SAME TRAINING IN THEIR MAGIC THAT ANY OTHER SORCERER OF HONALEE WOULD GIVE THEIR STUDENTS!** the Jagdsprinz drowned her out. **YOU COULD HAVE KILLED IT AS SOON AS THE HUNT FELL, AND YOU KNEW THIS. YOU _SHOULD_ HAVE KILLED IT AS SOON AS THE HUNT FELL, AND YOU _KNEW THIS._**

Ereshkigal’s expression went thunderous and she opened her mouth-

**DO _NOT_ TELL ME THAT YOU WERE WAITING FOR TEUFELMÖRDOR! YOU HAD _NO WAY_ OF KNOWING WHO OR HOW- AHES GAVE YOU NO NAME BUT THE TITLE! THIS WAS _YOUR_ DECISION, ERESHKIGAL, TO LEAVE THE DEMON MEPHISTOPHELES AND TO _WAIT_. TO NOT COME WHEN YOU FIRST FELT THE DEMON ARRIVE IN THE HEART OF THE HUNT’S LAND. SO TELL ME- HOW LONG DO YOU INTEND TO TAKE YOUR PETTY RAGE OUT ON THE FOLK OF THE KNOCKER-HILLS AND THE DOMDRUC BECAUSE THEY REFUSED TO BOW TO YOU?**

The street, already so quiet and still, went even more so.

Ivan reminded himself he had to breathe.

Nia hadn’t- she hadn’t _had_ to kill the demon. She’d wanted to anyway, but-

If she hadn’t killed the demon, if she and Zell and Heinrich had walked away and gone home and told the other Nations what they’d learned- she wouldn’t have become Jagdsprinz. Honalee and Earth wouldn’t have been joined. They wouldn’t have bled together at the edges and Amphitrite wouldn’t have been around to influence the Venetians into thinking of Feliciano as having a _right_ to head the government-

They wouldn’t have had Genism. They wouldn’t have the _Großjagdsreich_ or the Imperial Human State or the International Republican Confederacy.

Humanity had bought magic and international stability for the price of a share in- in _a cult of personality._

And they’d all _missed it._

 _He’d_ missed it. _China_ had missed it. _Cuba_ had missed it. The Italies, Spain, the _Koreas._

“You were not yet created,” the Queen of Irkalla said. “You were not yet born. You know _nothing._ ”

 **I was not there,** the Jagdsprinz agreed. **But I am the eternal outsider. I see _all,_ and secrets were traded kind for kind some twelve years ago. You wished to make the Knocker-Hills and the Rinnrharc and Avalon into the Summerlands. You found Lord Hiruz and told him the Summerlands would be forever warm and joyful. You told him he would be the land to the sea of Póli Thálassas and that you would put the sun in his antlers, day to the night of Kêr-Is-**

Ivan glanced over to Lord Hiruz. His colleague refused to look back at him, head held high and gaze fixed on no one.

It was an attitude a Nation knew well- defeated, shamed, but refusing to let go of their pride and dignity.

 **And when he refused you as was his right and as _was_ right, **the Jagdsprinz said. **_You_ made Beli Mawr King of the Tylwyth Teg, and let them sweep south and take the Knocker-Hills from their Folk and let the Distawydwr stalk in the grassy meadows on the edge of the forest and _massacre the ruzdrene,_ because your _pride_ had been hurt, because your _control_ had been defined- because the Folk of the Knocker-Hills and the Rinnrharc _dared_ to be happy and content _without your meddling._ And _then,_ Ereshkigal of Irkalla, when the griffins and the oreads and the huldrene created and answered to the Irvinrdisganheid, you took the honest plea of Gwyn King of the Tylwyth Teg and _twisted_ it to make the grandson of a genocidal King rule over those his family and his people had so wronged- and you told the last of the ruzdrene that this was simply the _beginning_ of his payment and that he must _serve_ those who had taken so much from him.**

The Jagdsprinz turned away from Ereshkigal and it wasn’t something Ivan would have _ever_ done, especially not with Ereshkigal looking humiliated and enraged like _that._

 **Erlkönig and Teufelmördor never knew of this _not_ because Ereshkigal kept it hidden from them, Hiruz of the ruzdrene, **the Jagdsprinz said. **But because there was nothing on your soul _to_ hide. The conquests of the Tylwyth Teg are not your fault. The fall of the Knocker-Hills is not your fault. The Distawydwr are not your fault. The destruction of your people is not your fault. The terrorizing of the huldrene is not your fault. You acted rightly and honorably by refusing her at the Tree and the Well, and not ascribing to yourself sovereignty over those whom had not willing given it to you. It is something Ereshkigal has never learned. **

“Honalee is _mine!_ ” Ereshkigal snapped. “It is _mine- I_ created it-”

**Parents do not own their children! You _cannot_ own any soul but your own; you can only _convince_ them that you do! **

The Jagdsprinz stamped its front hooves and snorted loudly, blowing a warm, earthy wind over the road.

**Marcus Aeneas Iovis and Luitgard Beilschmidt, Ereshkigal! When Nia and her siblings came! It was _disgraceful,_ showing them off so, with what you have done! They are not your playthings any more than Honalee is a diorama you can arrange to your pleasing! The Kingdoms of Honalee are an arbitrary construction and the Nations of humans are strange souls who do not die as others do, and as the one who is responsible for the conditions which allow them to exist-**

“I _created_ them.”

The Jagdsprinz looked down its nose at her.

 **You have never created a Nation in your life,** it told her. **_Humans_ create their own Kings. _You_ are simply to keep watch of their souls and provide a place for them so they do not become wandering ghosts when their humans have all died or left. And yet _you-_**

Red eyes flared and jaw gaped, teeth bared.

**You let them suffer because you did not _care._ You let them be destroyed because it served your purpose-**

_“It. Was. WITNESSED!”_

**YOU WERE TOLD THAT JAGDSPRINZ TEUFELMÖRDOR WOULD COME TO YOU, AND THAT AHES QUEEN OF KÊR-IS WOULD SEE THE FUTURE. YOU WERE _NOT_ TOLD THAT THIS WAS TRUE. YOU WERE _NOT_ TOLD OF THE DEMON MEPHISTOPHELES. YOU WERE _NOT_ TOLD OF THE DEMON BELIAL. YOU WERE _NOT_ TOLD OF THE NATIONS; OR THAT YOU DID _NOTHING_ TO SAVE THEM OR EASE THEIR PAIN. THE FALSEHOODS YOU HAVE SPUN AND THE POWER YOU HAVE CONNIVED FOR TO THE DESTRUCTION AND DETRIMENT OF OTHERS AND WHAT WAS DONE TO HEINRICH ADLER AND JOHANNES AND NIKOLAUS AND LUDWIG BEILSCHMIDT AND RODERICH EDELSTEIN RESTS AS SIN ON _YOUR_ SOUL, ERESHKIGAL QUEEN OF IRKALLA WHO CARES _NOTHING_ FOR THOSE SHE HAS CREATED AND HAS MADE EXCUSES TO HERSELF TO JUSTIFY HER ACTIONS AND CREATED HERSELF TRAITOR AND DECIEVER AND LIAR AND _DOES NOT DESERVE HER NAME._**

Ereshkigal glared pure  _fury_ up at the Jagdsprinz, and clenched her hands.

The universe cracked.

"I created Honalee and I created  _you,_  Jagdsprinz."

she said, voice unnaturally amplified. It wasn't like the Jagdsprinz's voice, more felt and understood than heard; a part of the universe. This was  _other,_  alien.

"Honalee is  _mine._  The Kings are  _mine._  I created  _you,_  and if you will not keep to your place then you shall have  _no_  place here."

The Jagdsprinz’s head shot up, nostril’s flaring and eyes burning brighter. Inside it, Nia took half a step back.

**You created _Honalee,_ not this universe-**

Ereshkigal raised her hands and flicked them away from her sides in a hard, controlled motion.

It didn’t feel like the time before, like an earthquake. It felt like steel cables fraying, unraveling, then snapping. The _twang_ s reverberated through the magic, but it didn’t _hurt._

It just felt wrong.

“You are _banished,_ Jagdsprinz.”

Ereshkigal said.

“You are no longer welcome. You are not as I made you. You have become an abomination. Go back to your nothingness and do not return. Let your fate serve as an example to those who would seek to break what has been made- what has been _decreed!_ ”

She only used one hand, for this. A flick, a dismissive gesture, and the Jagdsprinz was tearing away, smoke on the wind, through the cracks.

 **I am justice!** it raged as it tore apart. **I cannot be denied!**

Ivan felt his sense of people go with it, draining swiftly away as the Jagdsprinz abandoned words for a soundless bass bellow of fury and vengeful promise that got fainter and fainter as the dark receeded.

Ereshkigal looked at him- looked at _them,_ the Nations.

 _“Die,”_ she said. “Human no-longer-Kings who think so much of themselves. There will be no place for your souls to rest and none in Honalee will shelter you. You have no people. There is nothing for you.”

The last shreds of shadow, of the Jagdsprinz, blew through the cracks in the universe, and Ereshkigal clapped her hands together.

The cracks disappeared as though they had never existed. Nia swayed on her feet in the silence, gaze blank and lost and unseeing.

For a moment, it seemed like she might pull herself together- but then she shuddered, all down her body; and she was on her knees in the street, at Ereshkigal’s feet.

The Queen of Irkalla looked down at her for a moment, expression set and unforgiving as stone, before turning away.

Nia reached out and grabbed the twirling edge of her long shawl-wrap.

* * *

Everything was cold, and not-real. Even the cloth in her hand seemed too far distant.

She’d never been this empty before. Not even when Germany had died, when she’d been stateless, had she been this empty. Not even when the fire of the anger had gone out, stopped raging, and left her feeling off-balance and weighted down.

There was just _nothing._ The cracks had eaten up the Jagdsprinz and in the Residence she’d _liked_ not having some of that power, being able to look and not see the lies-

She looked and there was _nothing._

 _She_ was nothing- the Jagdsprinz was gone and her anger had burned out forty years ago and now her _children-_

“My children,” Nia said to herself; and something stirred inside.

The Jagdsprinz was _gone_ and in its wake she was hollow and scoured raw and everything was fading away, everything was unreal, if there wasn’t the Hunt wasn’t the Jagdsprinz _what was she_ but inside where she’d thought she was empty there was the slow slide of something, a film of water on cave walls or blood down the throat from a strike in the face.

Ereshkigal tried to yank the edge of the shawl-wrap out of her hand. Nia gripped tighter.

“My father,” she said, wondering if he’d felt this lost, this hollow and empty and the slow-bleed drain in his _soul_ that she was now, when the demon came for him. He’d just stood there. She’d been told he’d looked so empty, in those last moments.

These- these couldn’t be her last moments. Not yet. The Jagdsprinz was gone but she’d been _with it,_ with that strange living power she’d been sharing a soul with but never met before. She _knew_ what the Jagdsprinz knew; what it had said.

She had been awake. She had simply stepped aside, more than she usually did, when the Jagdsprinz had been called.

The Jagdsprinz had called Ereshkigal traitor and deceiver and liar and Ereshkigal had _fought_ the Jagdsprinz knew truth and the Jagdsprinz _could not_ lie about it and she had _seen_ everything on Ereshkigal’s soul the same way she had seen the lies and the sins and the transgressions on everyone else’s since the day she had faced Mephistopheles-

The Jagdsprinz had not lied; and now Nia knew why it was always _Mayet_ who was there when she brought dead Nations to Irkalla.

She had been _used._ She had been _played._ Her; and all her Jäger-

“My _people,_ ” Nia said.

Inside- a little spark.

Not anger. Not fury. Not rage- or not _really_ those things. She’d lived with them, and this was different. This was just-

 _‘Teufelmördor is **fire,** ’ _the Jagdsprinz had said.

 _Cold_ fire. Cold fury.

Breathe- and think of the betrayal, the lies, the deceptions, the _death-_

Hot. _Burning._

Maybe she was not Jagdsprinz but she was Teufelmördor and the Jagdsprinz did not lie and she was _fire._

“My _children,_ ” Nia said, Ereshkigal’s shawl-wrap straining as she pulled herself up off the street. White fire bloomed in her hands, along her arms-

“My _father,_ ” she said, bearing her teeth as she looked up into Ereshkigal’s eyes. The first time she’d seen them- the _only_ other time she’d seen them- the pure black had been sucking holes.

But she’d _seen_ black now, since then. True black, black from the inside- the Jagdsprinz. She’d spent centuries seeing lies. Holes held no fears for her.

Nia raised her free hand, the white fire defying gravity to burn _down,_ following the crook of her fingers and the angle of her palm, and the edges of the flame started to wisp out in golden-green.

Breathe and remember the _lies._ Breathe and feed the fire. Breathe and remember how to _hate._

Ereshkigal’s shawl-wrap was smoking black.

Breathe _out-_

Unnatural fire edged in pure magic roared with her; _struck_ with her.

_“MY PEOPLE!”_

* * *

János had _not liked_ Ereshkigal cracking the universe, and _not liking_ had gone straight to _how **dare** she _when the Jagdsprinz started wisping away, blown back through the cracks and _away._

This wasn’t like before. He’d _felt_ the little shivers through the ambient magic of the universe as the Jagdsprinz came free. She’d done that on _purpose._

Honalee- and humanity, now- _needed_ the Jagdsprinz. Without the Jagsdprinz, without the Hunt, everything fell apart. Maybe not completely, because humans had lived without the Hunt and they could do it again, but it wouldn’t be a pleasant process.

He’d never seen a civilization collapse before, and he _really_ didn’t ever want to live through it. This was an outright attack on- _everything,_ and it could take everyone and everything down with it _._

Seconds before the cracks in the universe froze, János had a _horrible_ thought.

_The Jagdsprinz said Nia gave it life._

And Nia- Nia had been living with it for almost seven centuries now. The Jagdsprinz was _meant_ to live with someone and if that was how things were _meant_ to work and if the connection had been strong enough and deep enough and _fundamental_ enough that the Jagdsprinz could gain power from the Hunt’s kills and a mind from the massacre of Erlkönig’s Hunt and independent life from Nia just _being_ there-

“Nico!” he snapped, grabbing his cousin’s coat to get his attention. “She’s _killing_ her!”

Nia was on her knees in the road and János took one moment to make sure _he_ was balanced, another to close his eyes and breathe-

Step out.

Try not to freeze; because souls weren’t supposed to look like that, and he’d been prepared for a certain amount of damage to the soul but _this-_

He’d seen plaster mesh with the mesh torn out. He’d helpedtear it out, more than once, as one of the many odd jobs you got, wandering, to pay for room and board.

János had never thought he’d seen what that would look like in a soul. Nia was _bleeding_ to death, golden-green and sparkling white from fraying life-force and _soul-essence_ and no, God no, he couldn’t _fix_ that. Life-force was easy, that was just magic; soul-essence was individual and unique it was who you _were_ and it bound everything else together and it was weakening enough to let everything dissociate.

Body left behind, life-force dissipated- that was death. That was normal, that he’d seen before.

But mind let loose, instincts intellect sapience _memories_ just _disappearing_ without anything to hold them; a mindless bodiless shadow-soul without an _identity,_ just scraps of soul-essence still hanging onto it- what would that even _be?_

Nia wouldn’t go quietly. This was a _willful_ destruction- a _murder-_ and János had never really _believed_ the stories the Domdruc Disrägner had of vengeful ghosts and violent spirits; but if anything could make one, he’d bet it would be a murdered King bound to a deathless power.

_The Jagdsprinz said that it had part of the dead Jäger from Erlkönig’s Hunt, and part of Erlkönig. The Jägerskov is the only place in Honalee that has a tradition of ghosts and purely-magical spirits, so what if the **other** parts-_

No, think about that _later._

János missed the fire, at first. He only caught Nia’s movement upwards, pulling on Ereshkigal’s clothes with one hand and the other with fingers curled like talons come up around over the shoulder down towards-

Nia’s fire was the same color as the magic she was losing. Golden-green-edged-white flared in Ereshkigal’s face and the Queen of Irkalla shoved her away. Soul-fueled fire rippled silently across Nia’s arms, shoulders, sides, sparking off her armor and shimmering in the fall of the fur of her cloak-

The step she caught herself with was strong and firm. The one she tried to take back towards Ereshkigal made her stagger to keep her balance. She found it wide-stanced and sagging, but still upright, some seconds later, never once breaking her focus on Ereshkigal.

The Queen of Irkalla scowled, raised her hands, and _no_ whatever she was going to do she’d already done _enough_ damage hurt _enough_ people **_no-_**

János flew at her in his second form, the great dark-feathered human-sized turul, claws out to catch and rake-

Ereshkigal’s movement of hands turned from spell to protection. She snapped them up in front of her face, wrists crossed in the easiest warding-off gesture that would rebound him as soon as he hit-

One great _beat_ of spectral wings and a magically-powered backdraft knocked Ereshkigal back some feet. János’s claws hit the ground as feet in a fluid change of form and an extension of his movement a little nudge of his momentum and a simple flow with change in direction and whatever Ereshkigal had meant to attack Nia with he deflected off into the street, where it scored a gash in the pavement Jäger jumped aside to avoid being caught in the path of.

So Ereshkigal had created Honalee. So she had banished the Jagdsprinz.

She was _scared_ of powerful magic she didn’t control, and the anger that had led to the banishment and this fight was born from that.

He was _Seelenkind_ sorcerer sündeyalacgh and he abided by the Jagdsprinz’s Pact, but she had _never_ controlled him. He was tired- he’d kept five people including himself from dying and killed a demon and it was going to take more than a little adrenaline and dragging to get his _body_ to go anywhere right now- but he _would_ take her, if she fought.

 _Apa,_ a voice in his head hissed. _She knew Apa didn’t make it to Irkalla and she never said **anything.**_

 They stared at each other a moment- János waiting, steady in his resolve; Ereshkigal with shock that swiftly changed to an outrage he could see past to find the hidden pulse of terror at facing someone who, even if he maybe wasn’t equal in her power, wasn’t _scared_ of it.

He was ready for her second attack. He saw it coming, in the little changes of expression and the slight shift of weight.

He was ready for it; but it never reached him, or Nia. It crossed some unseen line and the spell simply tore apart, joining the universe’s ambient magic once more.

Movement just in the corner of his vision- Nico had stepped up next to Nia.

A sudden shadow, a feeling of very occupied space at his back, a low rumbling growl and a musical flutter of simulated birdsong- Arik, as a dragon; and Árpád, from back by János’s body, caught without traditional instruments and improvising by hand flute.

Ereshkigal froze and Nia was somehow still standing but-

 _“Leave,”_ János told her. There was only one place she would go. They knew where to find her, when the time came to properly address what she’d done.

She left. He whirled around in time to see Arik collapse back into human form and grab Nia around the shoulders as she leaned into the touch and lost her balance again, falling back against him. He bore her weight and sank slowly to the ground, trying to lay her down-

“Try to keep her from making more fire!” János ordered Nico, and silently cursed to himself as he saw just how _much_ of herself Nia had managed to burn up in just the few moments he hadn’t been looking at her; _why_ was she drawing on _herself_ there was magic all around she could use instead she should _know_ better this was basic magic-

But had Nia ever actually _used_ magic? She was Jagdsprinz- why would she have ever needed to? Her disintegrating soul was the most concentrated magic in the area, and it was already _hers._ Did she even _know_ how not to use it?

“What happened-” Nico started to ask.

“She’s _hemorrhaging_ her _soul,_ ” János told them, disgusted and _furious_ at Ereshkigal for doing this and himself for not being able to _do_ anything about it. “The Jagdsprinz was bound up too closely with _her_ and Ereshkigal just _ripped_ it away- she’s not _dying_ she’s _self-destructing-_ ”

And if she _could_ turn into an angry ghost or _something_ it was probably better for them if they _weren’t_ around when she finally went. He’d have to track down the best Disrägner to exorcise her or however that worked; but Arik was clutching at her and one he wasn’t going to be able to get him to leave two having family to ease the passing just _might-_

János looked around, actually taking a look at who was here.

“Odette,” he called. “Germa-”

Sudden _appearance_ and he jumped, startled-

Maria put her hands down on Nia’s armor and there was a moment’s chaos of János reaching to pull her away Arik reaching to comfort his youngest sister Nico trying to figure out what do-

Arik caught himself on his hands as Maria shoved him off their _Elti,_ disappearing with Nia; and János just wanted to _stop._

So many people had died today. They’d lost so much.

He went back to his body, leaned sideways into Árpád’s legs, not opening his eyes, and just… let everything else continue on without him, for a while.

He was done.


	10. Stories in the Retelling

* * *

 

**PART THREE: LIES AND LAWLESSNESS**

_“Tell the truth, or someone will tell it for you.”  
_ _-Edgar Watson Howe-_

 

* * *

 

They could hear the Jagdsprinz’s voice from here, behind the Residence, but not what it said.

Ereshkigal, though- _that_ was loud and clear.

She’d _just_ gotten the Jagdsprinz put _back-_

Maria stepped out of the universe, trying to shove down the shaky feeling inside that she’d had since Mosè- General Costa- had said _‘witchcraft’_.

She hadn’t been _trying_ to- surely that counted for something? She was _sorry_ she hadn’t been trying to break the Hunt at _all_ everyone _needed_ the Hunt. Nothing would function without it. Whatever Ereshkigal was so angry about that she’d try to banish the Jagdsprinz back where she and Sebastian had just gotten it from, well, people would just have to sit down and talk calmly.

Breaking the Hunt had been an accident, but getting the Jagdsprinz back would be on _purpose._ Maybe not enough to totally balance out breaking it in the first place, but it should be a good start.

Out in the nothingness-chaos, the Jagdsprinz was in a frenzy, bounding back and forth, striking smoky hooves on the edge of the universe and screaming: a strange not-sound, animal rage and words on two different layers.

**ERESHKIGAL! ERESHKIGAL! DECIEVER TRAITOR NEGLIGENT _MURDERER-!_**

”Jagdsprinz!” Maria shouted at it.

She flinched when it looked at her, even though she’d tried to brace herself against it.

_Witch-_

“Calm down, please! I can take you back aga-”

**I SHALL ONLY BE BANISHED AGAIN!**

Shavings, scraped from the edge of the universe by the Jagdsprinz’s hooves, showered out into the nothingness and floated dustlike, shining faintly.

“You’ll break-”

**ERESHKIGAL IS BREAKING _ME,_ WORLD-BUILDER! LOOK TO TEUFELMÖRDOR!**

Maria looked. It had never made _sense_ how you could see anything from here, but you could. _Elti_ was on her knees in the road, clutching at Ereshkigal’s clothes to haul herself up, white fire growing-

“I’ve never seen fire made of magic before,” Maria said, fascinated and concerned at the same time. Mathematically, that was a _lot_ of magic to handle at once. She’d never heard of _Elti_ doing magic directly, but she _was_ used to the Jagdsprinz-

**THAT IS _HER_ FIRE TEUFELMÖRDOR IS _BURNING HERSELF TO DESTRUCTION_ AND ERESHKIGAL _WANTS_ HER-**

“But- Ereshkigal-”

**LIAR TRAITOR DECIEVER! TRAITOR! TRAITOR! CREATORS SHOULD STAND BY THEIR CREATED-!**

“Jagdsprinz!” she called again, and held up her hands, like she’d been told to do when faced with a frantic horse. “Jagdsprinz! What-”

The edge of the universe thrummed as the Jagdsprinz slammed its antlers against the barrier.

**NIA IS DYING SHE CANNOT DIE SHE IS _MINE!_**

_Elti_ couldn’t be dying. She was _Seelenkind_.

Maria glanced back over her shoulder, and saw Arik catch _Elti_ as she fell into him.

That didn’t- _Elti_ wasn’t supposed to be like that. Even if it was just dropping from exhaustion.

The Jagdsprinz reared back, like it was going to hit the edge of the universe again; and then, inside the universe, on that road, Sorcerer Héderváry looked at _Elti_ in pure furious _defeat._

“… _Elti_?”

 **I _need_ her, **the Jagdsprinz said. It was quiet, faint- fading? **She is fire, and I need her fire to stay as I am. Ereshkigal tore me away and ravaged her soul in the process and her soul is _disintegrating-_**

“No. No, no no no _no-_ ”

**We _need_ each other. To survive. **

“Then I’ll bring you-”

**Ereshkigal will return and-**

“Then I’ll bring her _here!_ ” Maria cried. “If you need each other then-”

**She will not survive here!**

“Then the Shining City; _that’s_ somewhere else entirely!”

A moment of stillness, somehow yearning-

 **Let me into your Kingdom, World-Builder,** the Jagdsprinz said. **_Please._ Before-**

Maria stuck her hand into the Jagdsprinz’s thick shadow of a body and stepped them to the Shining City, saw the Jagdsprinz’s darkness envelope her private workshop, took one step _back_ and dropped down to grab _Elti_ and push Arik away, shoved with one foot and leg to get the token movement that you needed to go from _here_ to _there-_

 _Elti_ seemed too fragile under her hand, and her armor melted into the shadows, making her feel even more insubstantial.

And then, a rush of darkness, blocking everything.

When Maria could see again, a moment later, the Jagdsprinz had shrunk down to Lord Hiruz’s size, and had curled up as tightly as a cold-weather dog on top of _Elti_. It was the strange double-image again, except the Jagdsprinz seemed more _solid,_ now that it had- condensed?

She wasn’t totally certain that the Jagdsprinz wasn’t _solid,_ now; but when Maria reached out a hand to check _Elti_ ’s breathing, she passed right through.

Nothing; and the armor was in the way for the pulse points so she had to move it to get to her _Elti_ ’s neck and wrist and _nothing_ again.

“Jagdsprinz?” she asked, trying not to panic. Surely, if something was actually _wrong,_ the Jagdsprinz would- “Jagdsprinz!”

No response, and Maria couldn’t very well push or shove something insubstantial to get its attention, or to wake it up. If it wasn’t responding, was it because it was ignoring her or because something worse had happened?

If it didn’t disappear, how was she supposed to tell if a spirit was dead or not?

* * *

Sometimes, all you could do was move. It had been a while since Ivan had been in a situation where things had gone so badly that _that_ was the only real recourse; but he’d done it before so he could do it now.

The Jäger were shaken and the Honalenier were frozen in shock and disbelief and the news media that remained was still searching for words and the chain of command had been ruptured and if he took charge _now,_ people weren’t likely to fight it.

“We need to get everyone back where they belong,” Ivan said to Lord Hiruz, nudging his fellow Marschall with a hand. “We cannot leave postings understaffed or undermanned. Is the World Gate still operational?”

Lord Hiruz looked at him blankly.

 _“The Hunt **cannot** fall apart,” _Ivan hissed at him.

“But-”

“You told me, centuries ago, that _I_ was expected to be Jagdsprinz after Nia,” Ivan reminded him. “She is not here and we were given no orders and I am a Marschall of the Hunt and _Razanás Wildes Jagd_ and so _I_ say that it is we two who shall hold the Hunt until such time that we again _have_ orders. The galaxy needs us. We _cannot_ let it fall apart as did Honalee!”

“Our legal basis of authority-”

“The lawyers can argue _later!_ ”

“That is not-” Lord Hiruz started to say, then stopped himself. He heaved a great sigh, and his hide rippled all down his back.

He raised his head and straightened, stepping into the posture of composed authority and command that Ivan was used to seeing him in.

“I suppose _‘not how things are done in Honalee’_ has even less legal justification, now,” he said. “We shall have to follow human rules. Yes, Ivan, I believe the Gate will open.”

“Then get it open,” Ivan told him, and stepped away, so he was in the empty part of the road.

“Generals, to me!” he called loudly. “Leutnant Filfaraskind, to Marschall Lord Hiruz- inform him of what needs to be done within the Residence!”

Having orders didn’t quite snap everyone into immediate action, but the loud announcement of a partial meeting of High Command was enough to get some people moving; and once the initial group momentum had begun it was easier for everyone else to start moving.

Ivan counted heads, briefly- Arik, Nico tailing Diana and Demyanev, Mäelle stubbornly refusing to be left out with a look on her face that promised a fight in the near future, Árpád straggling behind because they had had to hand their father over to his parents, was János going to need a doctor-

“ _You_ are not a part of the Hunt.”

Gilbert crossed his arms and tried to stare him down.

“It’s my business too,” he insisted.

That was everyone else’s cue to start speaking at once.

“ _Elti-_ ”

“What are we going to do about Zannah-”

“She was trying to _help-_ ”

“Where are our families going and how are we supposed to-”

“Ivan does this mean that everything’s going to _collapse-_ ”

Árpád’s voice stood out over the rest, because their tone was too-together, artificially calm.

“ _Apa_ said that the Jagdsprinz was self-destructing,” they said. “He said that she was hemorrhaging her _soul._ I don’t think it was something anyone could fix. I think she’s gone.”

“You mean _‘dead’_ , right?” Diana asked with trepidation.

“No,” Árpád said. “Gone. Like Germany. But worse, maybe. We’ll have to ask _Apa_ when he wakes up.”

He could not lose his _Prince-_

He couldn’t think about this right now.

“Whatever has happened to Nia, to the Jagdsprinz, she is not _here,_ ” Ivan said firmly, ruthlessly cutting off that line of conversation. “Mäelle, Demyanev, we will review Zannah Brahe’s case _later._ Generalleutnant Beilschmidt.”

Mäelle still looked like she wanted to fight about this, but her: “Yes, sir,” was purely professional.

“Escort your son, his husband, and their fiancée back to their precinct once the media has been removed and the police dispersed. Inform Investigator Brahe that she is to stay here in Kharad until the Hunt has sufficiently dealt with this situation; and _gently suggest_ to your son and his husband that she be kept from field duty for the foreseeable future.”

“Sir,” Mäelle replied, and stalked off.

“I don’t like it,” Demyanev said.

“Your opinion was not solicited, Generalleutnant,” Ivan half-snapped at him. “Our immediate tasks are thus: prevent widespread panic and rioting in the streets. Show that the Hunt and the _Großjagdsreich_ are, and shall continue to be, functional. Reiterate our authority, and be able to justify it in light of recent events when asked. Find a safe place, away from the media and others who would pry, to relocate our time-displaced visitors-”

“I’ll take them,” Gilbert immediately volunteered.

 _“No,”_ Ivan said. “This is witchcraft, and so the Hunt’s business-”

“My family-”

“You just want your _brother,_ Prussia,” he cut him off. “We will discuss Germany with you _later._ But they _will_ stay in the custody of the Hunt!”

“I think we could find room in Prarayer,” Diana spoke up. “But they should go to the Jagdshall first while that’s checked on, and people kicked out or moved around if they need to be.”

“War Room,” Nico murmured, and Ivan made a mental note to make sure that he got sent to sleep as soon as he could reasonably be spared. “Most private. Close up the Court Gallery and use that for High Command. Going to be a meeting, right?”

“After this,” Ivan said.

“A press release as soon as possible from Public Relations, in your and Lord Hiruz’s names,” Diana continued. “And a speech by you, or maybe Odette- maybe both of you?- promised for later. I don’t think today, make it tomorrow or the day after, this is a crisis where actions have to come before words.”

“Good,” Ivan told her. “Contact Prarayer for the living quarters and tell General Lusk and to begin work immediately-”

“He’s going to need Mosè,” she interrupted. “ _We’re_ going to need Mosè.”

Ivan’s first reaction was still to reach for his citizen-bond- but there were no Nations now.

“Ilya?” he asked.

 _‘Around the back,’_ the AI informed him, in his ear. _‘With Sebastian and Generalleutnant Costa.’_

And the _children;_ they were going to have to address the children and Nanshe and Ahes-

“Arik, Nico,” Ivan started to order, then shot Gilbert a look. “Gather up the old Nations and the children, and get them ready to go to the Jagdshall. Lord Hiruz will send them once the Jäger have been moved through. Come to the Court Gallery once you are done for the High Command meeting-”

“Emma?” Arik prompted- he couldn’t keep _anything_ straight in his head he was _forgetting_ things-

“Leutnant Filfaraskind will follow her to the hospital once inside the Residence has been cleared of any dead-”

That was _another_ thing he’d forgotten.

“Does anyone know where Governor Saab and her husband are?”

Glances were exchanged, and then heads shook all around.

 _‘Dead,’_ Ilya told him a moment later. Gilbert grimaced at almost the exact same moment. Ivan didn’t have the energy to spare to wonder about how the AIs had found out.

“Someone is going to have to tell Ravenna,” Ivan said, looking at Gilbert. “And Hadiya.”

“Fine,” Gilbert muttered after a moment.

“And tell Odette and Isolde and Michele to come over here.”

Árpád took a loud breath as Gilbert edged his way out of the group.

“Someone should call Congress,” they said. “The Kings have to be told. About…”

That, Ivan didn’t really know anything about. Calling Congress was a power of the Jagdsprinz that he wasn’t even sure had ever been used, and there wasn’t any particular reason that most of the Kings should listen to him and Lord Hiruz if they tried to call it in Nia’s name, anyway.

But, if they could get Amphitrite and Wángmŭ and Nicnevin behind them, and maybe Kaschei Perun-

“We will discuss this later,” Ivan told them.

“And there’s another thing,” Árpád continued. “A, uh. Amphitrite named Germany holder of kinright. Formally and officially and everything.”

That was _exactly_ the last thing they needed right now! That added four or five snarls of personal obligation on top of everything _else_ that was going wrong-

Well, maybe they could leverage it somehow. He wasn’t in the right state of mind to properly deal with the particular intricacies of the Honalenier webs of social obligation right now.

“Has anyone _else_ done something drastic that I have yet to be informed of?” Ivan demanded.

“Not where I wanted to come in,” he heard Mosè mutter. Ilya must have called him on his comm and told him to come, without being prompted. “Does anyone know where Maria went?”

“No?” Demyanev said, looking worried.

Ivan looked over his shoulder to check, and-

“General Costa,” he said. “What is it?”

Mosè shifted, gaze still hovering on the vicinity of the ground and unease written into every line of his body.

“Whoever sees her next,” he said quietly. “Should arrest her on suspicion of witchcraft.”

And Ivan was going to crash, _hard,_ as soon as he stopped moving because this was _too much_ ; but the only thing he could do was not to stop until things could function without him.

So- get the time-displaced to the War Room, get Isolde and Michele handling their regional governments, grab Odette, and _have that High Command meeting._

* * *

No one was telling them anything.

There’d been this whole thing about a demon and magic and time-travel, and some sort of parallel world. That should have been enough for the day-

But he had a horribly uncomfortably feeling that he’d very almost _died._ And then Cassiel had had some sort of psychotic break and yelled a lot about not being able to die and never going back, wherever _‘back’_ was exactly, to what sounded like multiple deaths by dehydration.

And then he’d killed- a lot of people. Though one of them seemed kind of like she’d killed _herself_ to get Cassiel driven away.

And then János had woken up and been all _strange_ and stalked out, and _Babbo_ had been _scared_ of _Vati_ and some woman _Babbo_ seemed to know really well had made a big speech about how impossibly old and powerful she was and said that _Vati_ was her _family_ ,and they’d left the building they’d been in and Cassiel had been _executed_ in the lawn and _Nia_ was-

And then that other woman had _done something_ and Nia _wasn’t_ and _Vati_ and _Babbo_ weren’t _Nations_ anymore again and Nia had tried to set her on _fire_ and then just collapsed like she’d been really hurt and János had looked really- when he started calling for _Vati_ to come see her and then yet _another_ person he didn’t know had come and just _taken his sister-_

The deer had _talked._ In _German._ It had sounded _Swiss._

It had said that they were going to someplace called the _‘Jagdshall’_ , but Nico was going with them and _Vati_ didn’t look like he knew what was going on and France- just _Monsieur_ Bonnefoy, now, again?- didn’t look pleased about the news but the other once-again-not-Nations seemed like they were going along with it without fear so he was _trying,_ he just-

He wanted some answers, yes.

But Heinrich had enough practice with self-introspection to know that what he _really_ wanted was Nia back, okay and _normal;_ and for _Babbo_ to look at _Vati_ like he always did, and to be _home_ where his cousin hadn’t killed anybody and he’d never seen anyone dead and people were _happy._

In another circumstance, the landscape would have been interesting. The lookout from the cliff where they’d come out was a very nice view of rolling foothills, and he wasn’t sure, exactly, why they had to be on _horses_ but the road from the cliff cleared quick, as soon as people saw Nico at the front of the group, even over the canyon. He’d never seen a natural stone bridge over a canyon before, or a city built down _in_ a canyon, and the horses made even less sense when there was entire _train station_ clearly visible from the road further along the canyon lip.

And there were all sorts of people along the road. A lot of them were like the hulder who’d been one of the ones trying to convince them to leave out of the hole in the wall, but a lot of the others looked human, just dressed in ways he wasn’t used to seeing. There were a number of people with complicated hair with lots of bits of blue; and other people who were dressed more like János had been; and he was certain there were other groups he was missing but beyond that he couldn’t tell what was _the future_ and what was just here and what was- whatever.

He wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting with the Jagdshall, but what they saw wasn’t it. The road turned paved near it, and he saw the other people on the road going through an arch in a wall was _there_ but also _not_ at the same time because the people on the road were acting like it existed but there were other people, mostly in the same sort of black uniform as Nico was and they weren’t going _through_ it but it just didn’t _exist_ for them and he didn’t understand and it was making his head hurt.

They didn’t get to see what was on the other side of the wall because Nico led them into some formal gardens and some other people took their horses and tried to stop him to talk, but Nico ordered them off in one of the languages people had been talking in that he didn’t understand- and this was the _frustrating_ one because it _sounded_ just like German but most of the words _weren’t_ German and a few he could guess but most of it he couldn’t make out or didn’t make sense at all. 

It was into the Jagdshall for them, through some back entrance that opened directly into a bare hallway that had the feel of back offices to him. They passed some doors and were almost to the other end of the hallway when Nico herded them up some awkwardly-placed stairs. The other one with them- Heinrich didn’t think he’d ever heard his name but he looked a lotlike _Onkel_ Gilbert and he’d been with Nia and how was he supposed to take that _-_ didn’t come up with them, but slipped off through the door at the end of the hallway.

At the top of the stairs, Nico opened an alarmingly thick and heavy-looking door that was sort of shoved in right next to the stairs, and they were all ushered inside.

This room looked… sort of welcoming, actually, if a bit oddly laid-out. To the right, a dividing wall separated the far, fully-functional kitchen from a bookshelf-lined area with some sort of futuristic computer-desk-screen-display thing at the far end. To the left, the room was open, though mostly filled with a large round wooden table, clearly cared for but beat up with age, and scattered with some books and papers. Past that, on the far wall, almost in the corner, was another door; and tucked into the corner next to the kitchen area, an antique wind-up grandfather clock, _tick-tock_ ing away softly.

“Please, _Papà_ ,” he heard Nico plead quietly, and looked back.

He and Zell and Rémy had been at the front of the group, right behind Nico. Behind them had been _Vati,_ and _Zio_ Vino and _Tio_ Antonio- but _Zio_ Vino had stopped dead on the threshold and crossed his arms.

“I _won’t_ ,” he said, expression oddly strained.

“Look I _know_ I didn’t really think this through,” Nico said. “And I’m sorry but this is the only place big enough and away enough from everyone else to put you until we can shuffle space for you to stay in in Prarayer, they’ll probably be done by dinner and then you can _leave_ and you never have to come back to this room again-”

“This isn’t,” _Zio_ Vino said, and then clamped his mouth shut and refused to finish the thought.

Nico sighed, like he knew what his father meant.

“It kind of is,” he said. “Nia kept this room and the foundation and the spots of the interior support we couldn’t tear down or move, and some of the façade out front. But the demon’s _gone._ The seven hundredth anniversary is in a few years.”

 _More_ demons?

“How does _Nia_ have anything to do with this!”

“She’s- she was Jagdsprinz.”

And that was something that _really_ needed more explaining, but first-

“ _‘Was’_?” _Vati_ asked, before he could.

Nico sagged.

“János,” he started to say, and then didn’t continue for a second. “János said. Germany- _Onkel_ Ludwig. Nia wasn’t _making it,_ when Maria _-_ ”

“The young blonde one?” Zell asked, sounding a lot steadier than Heinrich thought he could be, given the circumstances. But that was Zell for you.

“Nia named her for you,” Nico told her, looking over at them. “That was her youngest daughter. One of your nieces.”

Nia had _children? Adult_ children?

 “We don’t,” Nico tried to say, and ran a hand through his hair, and looked like the world was falling to bits.

 _Tio_ Antonio pushed _Zio_ Vino gently aside and reached to hug him-

 _“No,”_ Nico told him, stepping away. “ _Don’t_ try to hug me right now I _can’t_ if I let you I’ll just- and I _can’t do that yet._ ”

“You can give yourself a few minutes,” _Tio_ Antonio said quietly.

“No I _can’t!_ ” Heinrich’s cousin exclaimed. “Ereshkigal just undermined _everything_ and Nia’s probably _dead_ and _everyone saw_ because there were _cameras_ everywhere and Ivan-”

Nico was on human-name terms with _Russia?_

“-and Lord Hiruz are only going to be able to hold things together until someone starts _thinking_ about what the Jagdsprinz said and we don’t _have_ a Hunt right now and I have to go to a _meeting_ because we have to do as much as we can before people _stop listening_ because it’s not like there are enough of us to impose martial law-”

Nico was involved in something where that was an _option?_

“-so once _somebody_ stops a second and asks themselves _‘So if the Jagdsprinz is banished, **then** what?’ _everything is going to fall _apart_ and it’s been _centuries_ since Genism and the Republicans are actually _better off_ than us right now and who _knows_ what will happen to the Imperial State and the _Großjagdsreich_ doesn’t even _have_ succession procedures because _we’re always supposed to have a Jagdsprinz-_ ”

 _‘Greater Hunt Empire’_? Did that mean _Nia-_

“-and do we and the Kings even _have_ any legal authority how are we supposed to _justify_ anything and we haven’t even _told_ the other Kings yet but they’ll be _here_ soon and demanding answers and we’ve got a _crime scene_ to clean up back in Kharad with a bunch of dead people and _somewhere_ in here we have to figure out if Governor Saab is still alive and announce that her nephew died a witch and a traitor and figure out if _his_ claims of witchcraft on _him_ were true or not but we don’t have the _Hunt_ so how are we supposed to do _that_ and _shit **Dietrich**_ and then there’s _Forouzandeh-_ and we’re going to have to tell Odette about Maria-”

He clapped his hands over his eyes and half-pinched his nose shut between them, taking a few heavy breaths that still sounded very stressed.

“I have to go to a meeting,” Nico said after a minute. “So will you _please_ come in here? And stay here? Someone will be along later. When they’re ready at Prarayer.”

 _Zio_ Vino moved out of the door to put his hands on Nico’s shoulders.

“It’s not all on you-”

“Yes it _is,_ ” Nico insisted. “I’m a _General of the Hunt,_ I’m on _High Command,_ I’m _Seelenkind_ \- people _trust me_ and I have _responsibilities-_ ”

“The person coming by later,” Heinrich said. “Will they answer questions?”

“ _No,_ I don’t know _who_ it will be and it’d be _unfair_ of you to ask questions-”

“It’s not _unfair_ to want to know what’s going on!”

He didn’t usually snap like that, but it had been a _day._ It was clearly still a day for Nico and Heinrich felt bad about losing his temper, even a little, because his cousin didn’t need that-

Nico turned on his heel and shoved through the shelves in the library area until he found a book, then came back to thrust it at him.

_With Sorrow We Accept Our Fortunes: An Extraordinary Tale of Love, Doom, and Loyalty in the Lives of Our Nations._

“It’s the most unbiased explanation you’re going to get,” Nico told him. “It’s not going to be _nice_ but I can’t _do_ anything about that, this is _history-_ ”

He sounded like he was holding onto his nerves, just barely, so Heinrich didn’t respond.

“-so will you all _please_ get in here so I can _go to my meeting_ because right now civilization as we know it is a couple of comments on the planetary networks away from disaster and we’re not the Hunt right now really but we’re _Jäger_ and we have _responsibilities_ and one of them just turned into keeping Honalee and over one hundred billion humans spread across most of the galaxy from an impending collapse of their political and legal structures so _please-!_ ”

* * *

Maria had taken Nia, and surely she would have come back, if Nia-

She was the granddaughter of the first Jagdsprinz and the wife of the second, and she could stay composed as long as it took.

The Court Gallery was designed so that it could be cut off into two uneven spaces, and Odette sent immediately for Housekeeping, when she got back to the Jagdshall, to bring the dividers to close away the third of the Gallery at the throne end of the hall, and bring in a long table and chairs.

High Command. So Ivan and Lord Hiruz. Diana. Arik for Intelligence and Internal Affairs, Mosè for Legal, Nico for the Zauberen, Leontiy Yurivitch for Logistics, Ian Lusk for Public Relations and Diplomacy. Sorcerer Demyanev for the Witchbreakers, Mäelle for Intelligence Special Operations, Luisa for the Workshop, Marco Adimari for the Uaclleon Shipyards, Huīhéng Ruǎn for the Earth Division of Regiment Jäger and the Jäger stationed to the Jagdshall in general. Then, because they were trusted- Árpád, Boreas, the Kascheiyina sisters, Dariya, Cauac, Adalram, Merric, Siegrike, and Emma-

No, not Emma.

Ian and Marco arrived first, because they hadn’t been called to Kharad and weren’t tangled up moving people there.

“Your Majesty?” Ian asked quietly, after he’d made his perfunctory bow. “What’s happened?”

Odette counted out a slow breath.

“You haven’t heard?”

“Something happened in Kharad,” he said carefully. “Reports have been…”

“Béutros Saab is a traitor and a witch, by his own admission. The demon Belial twisted time to bring forward a number of old Nations and _Seelenkind,_ who were not snapped back when Beliail was killed. Cassiel Navin escaped Tartarus and Emma Miccichelo killed him. The Jagdsprinz-”

The throne was empty and Nia _liked_ it that way, usually; but right now it was a nasty reminder.

“The Jagdsprinz named Ereshkigal Queen of Irkalla liar and deceiver and traitor, and said that she does not deserve her name,” Odette forced herself to continue. “And then Ereshkigal banished the Jagdsprinz from the _universe,_ and Nia-”

A breaking voice meant _crying_ and now wasn’t the time, there was about to me a meeting. She waited until she felt like she could handle herself again.

“It’s _all **lies.**_ The Kings, Ereshkigal, the _Hunt-_ ”

“How about we sit down?” Marco suggested, taking her lightly by the arm to lead her to a chair because she couldn’t fake being calm well enough, right now.

Sitting down didn’t make her feel better. Her automatic reaction was to sit up perfectly straight and try to look like she was in command, and pretending was exhausting.

Arik was next to come, slipping silently into the room. She was trying to think of something to say to him- she knew how attached he was to his mother- but they ended up just _looking_ at each other and Odette slid out of her seat to the floor to hold Arik as one of the Hunt’s Hounds, leaning into her.

She missed everyone else arriving, clutching to Arik and not quite breathing in enough air through the heat of trapped carbon dioxide and the dog-smell of fur. Isolde arrived at some point, curling up with them in absolute misery; but Odette didn’t move until she felt a large, familiar hand settle on her back.

“We are about to begin,” Ivan told them quietly, and they disentangled. Someone thoughtful had put out water, and Odette drank some of her glass with difficulty. The back of her throat was tense and sore from trying not to cry in front of the other people who were supposed to be holding everything together.

Ivan recapped the events of the morning so everyone knew what was going on, and Odette blocked out all of it in numb silence, staring blankly at the far wall.

“I’ve sent some of my people over to Public Relations,” she came back to Mosè saying. “Ian and I will go down once we’re done here to check on how the statements are coming, if they haven’t already finished and run them up here.”

“Our visitors are up in the War Room,” Nico reported tiredly. “They’re not happy about it. Prarayer is shuffling things around, and say they’ll be ready by dinner.”

“Zannah Brahe is on administrative leave, pending evaluation,” Demyanev said. “Ahes- she wanted to see Kêr-Is and I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t have been able to stop her if we’d tried, so I asked Queen Amphitrite to keep an eye on her. They’re going together, and if Ahes does anything- they’re both Kings. It was the best I could do at the time.”

“I have informed General Beilschmidt that he is not currently a welcome guest unless he comes on official business,” Ivan said. “We will see how long that holds up. So. The Hunt’s business and the legal structures are being looked after as well as possible, given the circumstances.”

“We will call a public Irvinrkallrene for this evening,” Lord Hiruz said, after a short glance to Adalram, Merric, and Siegrike. “To inform the Domdruc of what we have learned.”

“We’re going to have to do it in Nysa,” Adalram added. “The glade isn’t big enough. Others are going to hear.”

Huīhéng sighed.

“I’ll have more Jäger assigned for tonight, then,” she said. “Don’t start until you hear from me. We can’t have unrest in Nysa. And, Ian, we’re going to need a statement for the Honalenier, to go out with the trains. Official word needs to get around before rumor does.”

It took half a minute, but eventually Odette realized that Huīhéng was done and everyone was looking at _her._

“I,” she said. “I was going to go to ask for an emergency session of the _Fürstsrat_ to address the delegates, if one hasn’t already been called. And the _Conseil d’Etat_ \- but I guess I could let the _Président d’Etat_ talk to the _Conseil_ instead. And I’ll call to Roman Senate, and-”

“Delegate,” Ivan told her firmly.

“It’s my people, Odette,” Isolde said quietly. “ _I’ll_ talk to the _Conseil,_ and Michele can talk to the Senate, and the others can do their subsidiary governments. The _Fürstsrat_ is the Imperial body. They’re the only ones who _need_ you.”

Less work sounded good, but at the same time if she _wasn’t_ doing something-

“Those of you who do not have assigned tasks must present an example,” Ivan said. The meeting was wrapping up, then. “We _must_ remain in control. We _must_ remain stable. We _must_ show that the Hunt is still functional.”

He leveled a look at Nico.

“Which is why _you_ are off-duty.”

“But-!” Nico started to protest, and Odette silently commiserated. 

“You have spent all morning fighting a demon,” Ivan said sternly. “Go eat something. _Sleep._ You may come back this evening for an hour or two, _if_ there are pressing new developments.”

He looked around the table.

“I will be remaining here. This will be our center of operations until it is no longer needed. I expect reports and updates as they are warranted.”

Odette wasn’t used to having meetings with Ivan, but the others were. She was momentarily surprised when Mosè and Ian stood up to leave, without any formal dismissal.

“If anyone sees Maria,” Mosè said. “Make her come talk to me instead of running off again. We need some questions answered.”

Leontiy and Huīhéng left, and Marco, and Isolde, Odette followed them out. The sooner she was done with talking to the _Fürstsrat,_ the sooner she could take some time to herself and just _stop._

* * *

Nico had left once everyone had come into the room, and closed the door behind him. No one had really spoken since he’d left, because their parents were very carefully avoiding looking at Heinrich, and the book he was holding.

Zell drew herself up, set her shoulders, and told herself that yes, Nico had said they wouldn’t like it- but they’d survived the day so far, hadn’t they?

“Let me see that, Heinrich,” she said, holding out a hand to take the book. He handed it over, and she looked over the cover.

The title was a little too dramatic for her tastes- _‘Love, Doom, and Loyalty’_ ; _really?_ \- and she wasn’t sure why a psychologist had written it, but that was what it said.

It felt strange, in her hands. It was seemed fragile in the way she associated with old books, but this was obviously modern binding and modern printing. It was even from a publishing house she recognized, Hillcaster-Duvanti.

She opened it carefully, and paused first on the copyright page, very aware of the way everyone was watching her.

“Well,” Zell said. “Whatever else, they still spoke German in 2119.”

2119- that was such a far-away date. Almost a century and a decade after her year of birth. It was comforting in its own way, though. That long, and they still spoke German. Things couldn’t have changed _that_ much.

The next page was the Table of Contents, surprisingly lacking page numbers- _‘Foreword’_ , _‘List of Nations’_ , _‘Family Trees’_ , _‘Part I: 2047’_ -

It was 2047 _now!_

Or, at least, it _should_ have been. It was 2047 for _her._

She looked again at _‘List of Nations’_ and _‘Family Trees’_ , with the date in mind, and felt very uncomfortable.

 _‘Part II: 2052’_ was the last thing on the list. 2052 was all right and not, at the same time. 2052 wasn’t _now,_ it was the future- but it was also a reminder that the future had _happened_ already.

“Zell?” Rémy asked.

“It’s just,” she said. “I think we’re in this.”

“What?”

“ _Us_ ,” she said. “All the cousins. It’s about 2047. And 2052. And it says there are _family trees._ ”

“We haven’t done _that_ much,” Øystein spoke, sounding perturbed. “You two are in government and Ásdís is in movies, but it’s nothing for a history book.”

“If it’s about Nations, I guess you’d have to talk about us, too,” Tomoko said, though she didn’t seem that convinced.

“Well, what does it say?” Ásdís asked.

“Just a second,” Zell told her. “Let me look.”

Immediately after the Table of Contents came the Foreword.

_‘This book was an accident.’_

Well, that didn’t sound good.

“He was a psychologist working off case notes,” Zell said, reading through the beginning. “I don’t know why he- oh.”

“Zell?” her husband asked.

“My office is in here,” she said. “He worked at my office. He worked for _me._ ”

There was a coil of tension in her stomach. Her life’s work was Nations, doing what she could to make their lives better and easier; and this man who’d worked for her had just _written_ something that seemed like it was supposed to be a tell-all- that wasn’t _allowed._ Nations had little else but their privacy, and even that was shaky.

She hoped she’d fought this, hard.

Zell scanned through the next few sections, looking for something damning.

 _‘You’ve got a lot of shit here that will never see a history book,’_ was attributed to _Zio_ Vino, and she wished that he had been right, and that it had stayed that way, whatever this was. If the author had worked with Nations, he had non-disclosure agreements to hold to, and this couldn’t have fallen within them.

_‘The larger picture **must** be seen, Mijnheer Schumacher… you are employed to be the Nations’ psychologist… We know the people have to be told-’_

Zell looked up from the book, and to her father and her uncles and the other not-currently-Nations.

“You _made this_ ,” she told them, even as she struggled to believe it. “You went to this man and _told him_ that this was the story that _had_ to be told.”

“…Ridiculous,” _Onkel_ Roderich said. “We don’t _do_ that sort of thing.”

“But what if we couldn’t avoid it?” _Nagynéni_ Erzsébet asked. “Nico took it out when Heinrich asked for answers. Honalee and Earth clearly live together, now, and who would explain them to our people but us?”

“Ridiculous,” _Onkel_ Roderich repeated, but sounded a little less sure this time.

“ _‘I gave her only one demand for the book itself, word passed on from Canada- whenever a draft was finished and edited, before anything else could be done with it, it had to be approved by the Nations,’_ ” Zell quoted from the book. “ _‘Arenu had no end of objections to this- it would compromise my vision, it would bias the story, international politics would have everyone trying to make themselves look better and it would never go anywhere. I told her that I was writing about their lives, and they had the final say about what I got to tell the world about them.’_ ”

That was better than it could have been, but it still felt _wrong._

“Even with that sort of control, how could we trust it?” England demanded.

“Perhaps it was too important _not_ to give trust,” _Oji_ Kiku suggested quietly, and that started up an angry, hushed argument between him, England, Norway, France, and _Zio_ Vino.

 _‘-covered in Zell Beilschmidt’s handwritten annotations,’_ Zell read, and glared at the paper. She’d been _involved_ in this!

But, if that was true, then didn’t it mean she’d had some oversight on all of this? That she’d managed to keep people’s privacy as safe as she could?

That had better have been how this happened. There was _nothing_ not worth protecting Nations. They needed everything she could give, with the things humans could do to them.

Thankfully, _‘we waited seventy-nine years and eight months to publish the book you now hold in your hands’_ sounded a lot like protection.

 _Vati_ came up behind her, and put a hand on her shoulder.

“Does it say _why?_ ” he asked.

“I don’t think so-” she told her father, and flipped the page over. The rest of the Foreword took less than half of the other side.

_‘It’s a hard thing, to stay deliberately in the background for centuries, and then decide to tell the universe things you never intended for a wider audience. To open yourself up for censure, and critique, and ridicule; to air your shame and your fear. It’s easier not to.’_

This Keld Schumacher sounded like he’d… _cared_ about how the Nations had felt about this. Like he’d _understood,_ like she or Heinrich or her cousins did.

Like the Nations really _had_ trusted him, enough to tell him how difficult things were.

She wasn’t sure she liked that. She still didn’t know this man, and maybe the Nations had trusted him, but she still wanted to vet him herself.

“Zell?” _Vati_ asked. She’d cut off, and hadn’t started talking again.

“ _‘The majority of their children are dead or dying now, just as I am,’_ ” she read to him, and her stomach fluttered and flipped over. The hushed argument about trust stopped immediately. “ _‘And this is their story and their lives just as much as it is their parents. Much of the information not directly related to the political situations I gathered through interviews with them- at least half of this book is theirs; and I’m certain that their parents wanted to give them as much privacy as possible. If you take nothing else from this book, please, know that the one thing that can never be doubted about Nations is that their children are very dear to them, and they love them greatly-’_ ”

Zell cut off again, because that was _very_ emotionally honest; and the Foreword was from the author of the book and if _this_ was the tone of the whole work-

 _Tio_ Antonio appearedtook the book from her, gently; and Zell leaned into her father for support.

“ _‘I hope you the history I have to tell in these pages means as much to you as it does to the people who lived it,’_ ” he said, telling everyone the final line of the Foreword, and then looked to the others.

“I don’t know what this is, exactly,” _Tio_ Antonio told them. It sounded a lot like his meeting voice, but it wasn’t quite it. “But it was important enough that we put ourselves out in public, _deliberately,_ so everyone would know what _we_ thought of it, even though we knew we wouldn’t like it. I think we should read it.”

“Were we not _going_ to?” _Zio_ Vino asked, tone biting.

“I’d like to sit down if we’re going to do it now,” _Nagynéni_ Erzsébet said. “That’s a decent-sized book.”

 _Tio_ Antoniostarted flipping through the pages, going forward, then backward, then forward again.

“It looks like the chapters are months,” he said, finally stopping a ways into the book. “I found November 2047. And of course we can sit down. I’ll read.”

There was some shuffling to get people into seats. There weren’t enough chairs around the table to fit everyone, so most of the Nations remained standing. _Tio_ Antonio nudged _Vati_ into sitting between her and Heinrich, and stopped _Zio_ Vino from sitting down just to get up and sit down somewhere else, twitch, and try again by taking a seat with a partial view of the grandfather clock _Zio_ Vino was so jumpy about, and pulling his husband down into his lap.

 _Nagynéni_ Erzsébet tried to do the same with _Onkel_ Roderich, but he spluttered and fidgeted and went bright red until _Nagynéni_ let him go.

Zell looked over the table with an eye trained to evaluate pre-Nations’-meeting gatherings. Gianna and the woman with England were obviously not really listening, understandably. Everyone seemed to be, though; and even looked like they weren’t going to make trouble.

 _Zio_ Antonio started reading. It was mostly about the upcoming wedding between the royal families of Liechtenstein and Denmark, nothing Zell had been keeping a close eye on once she’d ascertained that the Nations involved weren’t inclined to start any drama over it, and that Liechtenstein was keeping her brother’s grumbling about other people having foreign influence on her to a minimum.

The _interesting_ parts were the new young Nations in Italy and Spain, and the story of how Keld Schumacher had gotten hired.

Zell felt a little better about things, hearing that she’d had extensive background checks run on potential candidates for this psychologist position that had probably been handed down to her office from on high, and that she’d sent Rémy to go talk to candidates. She certainly trusted her husband’s judgement.

The section where Schumacher had run down his list of first thoughts about the Nations, upon reading their names, was alternately amusing and cringe-worthy. She and Heinrich both looked at _Vati_ at the same time when _Tio_ Antonio looked sadly at the upcoming words, but read out: “ _‘Check on status of Prussia re: Nazis’_ ” anyway.

Soon after came a section about England and the woman with her, in Honalee. Zell fixed her name in her memory- _Irene-_ and paid close attention to the details of the place. The description of it didn’t sound that different than that of any rocky seacoast on Earth, but presumably it would get strange and fantastical eventually.

It didn’t come that section, though, because the narrative skipped to Giovanna and _Patre_ Cris, in the Vatican, and-

“Gianna,” _Zio_ Vino said in a huff. “You have a _boyfriend?_ ”

Her cousin just ducked her head silently, and _Zio_ Vino backed off without saying anything else. This wasn’t a good time for teasing.

Adán Salcedo Esparza’s speech was fragmentary, but Zell was unsurprised to hear that he’d turned into another dictator. No one had really expected any different.

Then England and Irene, and there was a sleeping dragon in cave, that sounded more like magic, and back again to Keld Schumacher-

“ _‘Government-extraterrestrial complex’_?” Ásdís quoted back to _Tio_ Antonio, who looked surprisingly uncomfortable about it. Her tone was _just_ on this side of scathing.

“I’m not the one who said it,” he told her, and then kept reading up until he hit the phrase _‘Police Raid of Brothel’_ and shook his head sadly at his friend, his lack of overt disapproval made up for by the way _Vati_ frowned sternly at him, and Rémy pointedly refused to look at his father.

France just shrugged expansively.

“Why not?” he asked rhetorically. “Though, I wonder how she found out?”

Zell had to ask herself that question about the phone video of Switzerland. Where _had_ Hanna Schumacher found these things? It couldn’t all be luck.

And then the color photograph- she had to set her jaw for that one, and sat fuming even as she told herself that Keld Schumacher would have had no way of knowing what her family was like, but even the distaste in _Tio_ Antonio’s voice as he read out: “ _‘L.B., G.B., R.E.? re: Nazis, Neonazis, white supremacists. L.B. visibly ‘Aryan’; also Rémy B.,’ he wrote as the picture printed out. ‘Rémy B. exchanged likely-French surname for his wife’s German. I am also ‘Aryan’, background checks supposedly run’_ ” didn’t do much for the biting anger at the insults inherent in the man’s thought process.

 _They’re better than that!_ she thought angrily at an imagined specter of the psychologist. _Vati is better than that! How **dare** you say those things about my father and my husband!_

 _‘He’s completely delusional and sodding insane. Why does the government let him out?’_ about England was no better, but at least it wasn’t something the psychologist had thought. Zell didn’t like the implications of _‘let him out’_ \- like the government didn’t have enough control over their Nations already. It wasn’t funny when you knew that they _could_ be ordered to never leave their office, and then have to obey it.

“ _Figure Eight’_   _was another picture, this one clearly taken surreptitiously from across an outdoor café’_ ,” _Tio_ Antonio read out.“ _‘There were two men in it, one of them leaning across the table to kiss the other. A bit of text inserted in the bottom corner read’_ oh my God it’s a stalker photo! Lovino! Someone took a stalker photo of us!”

“The _fuck_ they did!” _Zio_ Vino exploded, and snatched the book out of his hands, expression going even more enraged as he read over the relevant section.

“Well, it’s in the book, isn’t it?” _Nagynéni_ Erzsébet said quickly. “So people _knew._ She must have gotten arrested.”

Her volume dropped to a mutter.

“She _better_ have gotten arrested.”

There was a break in the reading as everyone looked uncomfortably at each other, and _Tio_ Antonio tried to get the book back from _Zio_ Vino. He finally managed to succeed, and thankfully, there was nothing worth of comment for a while, long enough for _Zio_ Vino to calm down. By the time the narrative got back to Keld Schumacher, and the _ridiculous_ excuse for an essay that decided that _aliens_ were the reason Nations existed, everyone could scoff at it and feel better.

So of course the mood was immediately dampened by the next section being about Russia and Ukraine with a slowly-dying Belarus. _Tio_ Antonio read quietly through that one, and the table was silent. Zell wasn’t sure if it was latent fear of mortality, or a respect for the clear pain Russia and Ukraine had dealt with.

Then it was boring wedding details until _Tio_ Antonio got to a point where _Zio_ Vino dragged _Babbo_ away from the wedding reception to talk about the Italian Autonomous Regions.

“ _‘Stop trying to bullshit me, Veneziano!’_ ,” _Tio_ Antonio read, and Zell could _hear_ it in _Zio_ Vino’s voice. “ _‘You fu-’_ ”

 _Tio_ Antonio came to dead stop and stared down at the page.

“What?” _Zio_ Vino demanded.

 _Tio_ Antonio said something too low for anyone else to hear, and _Zio_ Vino’s expression twisted. He picked up the book and started reading, silently.

“Hey!” England said. “We’re supposed to-”

“ _Some_ things you get to decide who you’re going to tell, England!” _Tio_ Antonio _snapped_ at him, _angrily,_ and England shut up in surprise.

Well, now Zell was desperately curious.

“I’m not going to read this out loud,” _Zio_ Vino said after a couple minutes. “And you can’t fucking _make me,_ because there’s _some things_ you don’t throw around for everyone to see-”

“You already did,” _Onkel_ Roderich said. “It’s-”

“ _I_ haven’t agreed to publish this yet!” _Zio_ Vino cut him off. “And I say that this is some personal family shit you don’t need to know the details of! I threw the mess everything was during the Italian Unification back at him because of the new Nations, _he_ said he just wanted them to grow up safe and happy, we had an argument about it, and that’s _all I’m saying!_ ”

“But-”

“That was the end of the chapter and we’re going to the next one!” _Zio_ Vino declared. “ _‘Chapter Five. December’_.”

* * *

She had left Feliciano behind in Venice, to try to handle the Second Republic from there. Amphitrite didn’t much like doing it, with the way her wife was right now and everything that had happened, but Póli Thálassas was going to need her-

 _But do they really?_ was the whisper in her head. The Jagdsprinz had said that Ereshkigal had deceived them all, and one of the things she had always put emphasis on was the Kings. She still remembered being young, and learning to read and write and do magic at Ereshkigal’s feet, listening to the Queen of Irkalla talk about how Honalee was ordered and controlled in Kingdoms, and how she, Amphitrite, was the first, but there would be others later.

If Póli Thálassas didn’t _need_ her, then what was her point?

 _No,_ she told herself as she walked along the seabed, her jewelry properly anchoring her here, instead of weighing her down as it did on land. Ahes was behind her, the dull colors of her working outfit slipping in and out of the edge of Amphitrite’s view as her own robes fluttered and rippled in the water. _Think. You have lived alongside humans for seven centuries. The Venetians do not consider Feliciano infallible, only a much better choice to run their state. The state is necessary to provide order, and protection._

And with the Jagdsprinz gone, everyone would have to fall back on their states, their Governors and Kings-

_I do not want to live through the time of Llud Llaw Eraint again._

But that was what Ereshkigal had sentenced them to. The Jagdsprinz had been banished, and all the old rules were back.

Promises and vows were binding. Duty, once given or accepted or forced, could not be discarded. The unbreakable contract that had caused so much grief amongst Llud Llaw’s children was back again. There was no intermediary with conscious, mortal reasoning to temper the effects such a thing had on those who touched magic.

Everyone would have to be very careful with their words.

The sea floor was broken up here by cracks and chunks of broken stone. The view was unobscured by any growth, despite the relatively warm and shallow water.

Ahes froze on the lip of the crater, and looked down to her sunken city, her lost Kingdom.

“It hasn’t changed a bit,” she said quietly.

Kêr-Is _hadn’t_ changed in all these thousands of years. The city itself was made of stone covered in plaster murals, yet nothing had eroded, and none of the paint had dulled. The impact onto the sea bed hadn’t cracked even the most fragile glass, and seawater hadn’t rotted away the wooden doors or shutters.

Póli Thálassas had seen its share of shipwrecked Kūlún junks and Buyanov cogs, done in by storms or a wrong landing on the rocky shallows of the mainland, or an ill wind blowing them into the cliffs of the Jägerskov. _Those_ rotted, their goods breaking under impact or disappearing with time.

Those had bones. Bones that had once been part of bloated, rotting corpses.

Even from the edge of the crater, you could see the bodies in the streets of Kêr-Is. Long hair and loose cloth still floated in the water. The only thing missing was blood.

“My people are still here,” Ahes said, and the heartbreak in her voice-

“Mine avoid this place,” Amphitrite told her old neighbor. “It is not said much any longer- not since Teufelmördor retook the Jägerskov, I think because everyone wanted to be done with the malice and danger of the past and start anew- but we have eyes. Kêr-Is is untouched. Nothing grows here, when it should. We would have said that it is a place frozen in time, but the water moves through the streets. There are angry ghosts here, and we are not fools enough to venture closer, even if the younger generations think that it is just the knowledge of what happened here that makes them uncomfortable.”

Ahes looked at her in surprise.

“You don’t tell them about _angry ghosts-_ ”

Amphitrite shrugged.

“They have grown up with humans,” she said. “And the humans are willing enough to believe in demons, when one rampages across their planet; and in magic when it has demonstrable rules and measurable results. But angry ghosts-”

She rolled her eyes.

“The humans who believed in ghosts, thought that you could get _lost_ on your way to wherever souls go, or didn’t _know_ that they were dead. They do not naturally touch magic, so they are not caught in contracts and duties and debts as we are, so they do not make ghosts unless someone traps their souls before they can leave. And even _that_ is theory and stories, not any practice I have heard substantiated. The killing of the demon Mephistopheles fulfilled the debts owed to any angry ghosts the slaughter of Erlkönig’s Hunt had left behind, and we were accustomed enough to those here. And they were ghosts left from a _Hunt,_ which should not have happened-”

“But their deaths were _unjust,_ ” Ahes said. “Yet dealt by the Hunt. That’s more than enough to create a city full of angry ghosts, and sustain it against water and salt. And Erlkönig is dead himself, and now there _is_ no Hunt.”

“They stay in the city,” Amphitrite told her. “I don’t dare go closer, even King as I am. Souls are not my business. But if you want to go, and walk your streets again-”

“I can’t,” the Queen of Kêr-Is said. “They’re full of the bodies of my people. I _can’t-_ and I’m the _Sun,_ Amphitrite. It would take more than all of the water of Honalee and in the entirety of Earth’s solar system to put me out, but I don’t belong underwater. My people don’t either.”

“I cannot raise it,” Amphitrite said. “And you may be powerful, Ahes, but the _Jagdsprinz_ sunk your city. The Jagdsprinz is the only one who could raise it again. Or Ereshkigal.”

“I will _not_ ask her for anything!” Ahes snarled, and the water around her started to seethe. Amphitrite moved the excess heat away to dissipate into the larger ocean with a little movement of her fingers. “She-!”

“I heard,” Amphitrite said, once it was clear that Ahes’s rage had overcome her words.

There was movement down in the city, and she deliberately refused to look. Alone, none of the angry ghosts below could pose a threat to her- she was Empress of Póli Thálassas and Queen of All Waters, and in her own Kingdom. But there were _thousands_ of them down there, and they would be in _their_ home, and their Queen was angry.

Ghosts could do things those living couldn’t.

“If there is one good thing that I can take from today,” she continued. “It is that I now have an answer for _why_ this place exists as it does. These ghosts are owed their mortal lives. The possibility of judgement of the Jagdsprinz or the vengeance of family and friends and other ties of allyship that would be enough to prevent ghosts from forming in the first place cannot apply here, because the entire Kingdom is dead, and it was the Jagdsprinz’s debt to pay back.”

Weak sunlight rippled and shifted on the rock below their feet, disturbed by the movement of waves on the surface and clouds in the sky above that. Ahes wasn’t looking away from her city- she was staring down into the crater, gaze focused.

“The entire Kingdom is _not_ dead,” she said, and before Amphitrite had registered what she _meant,_ the Queen of Kêr-Is had stepped past the lip of the crater and planted her feet firmly within the boundary of the city’s watery hinterland.

“There is no Jagdsprinz to-”

“I am Ahes Queen of Kêr-Is,” Ahes said to the crater and the ghosts of the city. She spoke in Irkallan, and the sound carried unnaturally through the sea water. “The Sun, First of the Ramman, Star-Made-Flesh, Sorceress of Shar-Under-Sky. My crown is the little stars and the captured nebulae, my power is the stardust of life-from-death and creation-from-destruction. You, my people, _came_ to me, when I fell from the sky and was granted this one piece of land on which to build a city. You _chose_ me, and I accepted you, and so here and now I promise you by that choice and my duty as your Queen and my own sense of what is right and fair restitutions for the unpaid debts of your unjust deaths dealt by those who claimed to _be_ justice!”

The ghosts didn’t answer from the city. They didn’t have to.

“You cannot go back on that,” Amphitrite said, resisting the urge to retreat to _her_ city, and never come back this way. “You’ll destroy your own soul, and you won’t have a choice, if that’s what it takes to satisfy those ghosts. There is no Jagdsprinz to void your contract, or override the ghosts and decree that their debts have been paid, no matter their personal feelings.”

“Then the Jagdsprinz will be found, and come fix what it has wrought itself,” Ahes told her. “Or no one will be able to send me to my death and fix disrupted time until _my people_ have been properly cared for.”

* * *

Lovino was barreling through the beginning of the next chapter, clearly trying to put as much distance as possible between now and the part he’d refused to read out loud. He went so fast that Ludwig would have missed an important line, if Lovino hadn’t stumbled in the middle of reading it, caught up in the realization of what it _meant_ was probably about to happen.

 _‘So go the other way,’_ Zell said, in the future-past on the page. _‘The last time we were here we never went up into the woods.’_

The woods of Martigny. The woods around Switzerland’s house on one of the mountain slopes above the town, the woods they’d _told_ their children not to go into because they _knew_ what was hiding in those trees-

People had been calling Nia Jagdsprinz _Teufelmördor,_ and he’d seen the way Lovino had reacted to that clock.

Ludwig felt like he was going to be sick, and by the expressions of the other not-currently-Nations in the room, they weren’t doing much better.

“ _Far_?” Øystein asked Norway, noticing the reactions.

“We’ve dealt with another demon before,” Norway said after a moment. “It was infesting a house- a mansion. In the woods in Martigny, not very far from Switzerland’s.”

“…oh,” Øystein said, voice very small.

Lovino read on, more slowly, and Ludwig tried to piece together an idea of what the children were running into with what he’d been told about the House. A burned rope ladder, that sounded familiar, and his brother-in-law looked like he might give on reading right then, because it was _Vasco_ down that hole.

He kept going, though, and the children found the ruins of the House. Ludwig managed to delude himself into a fragile sense of hope until-

_‘Heinrich opened the red leather-bound book he’d dug out of the rubble-slide and opened it.’_

Oh no. No. Please no.

But of course.

The paintings were a new and disturbing addition to the information he had on the House, and he didn’t like the way Feliciano’s had been described as slashed up and torn apart.

“ _‘There was a sudden flash of gray across the mouth of the row,’_ ” Lovino read, and Ludwig wanted to grab his children and go hide them somewhere safe.

In the book, Heinrich managed to call Feliciano; and he didn’t feel _better_ but at least they’d managed to find out, relatively soon, that their children needed saving.

Lovino’s expression twisted as he reached the first of the flashback scenes, but he read on anyway, only to stop when Vasco’s name came up. He read the jerky retelling of the demon stalking his son in the basement unevenly, tone too flat as he tried to squash away the emotions.

Then description of the House, establishing everyone’s places- Kiku was visibly uncomfortable when Tomoko had a section all to herself, surrounded by books that knew her name- and then Feliciano.

And then a- hallucination? Within a flashback? Holy Rome, that would be the Holy Roman Empire, no one talked about him much-

Dead people in the walls- Nia had _seen_ that, no, why did she have to- Zheng attacked by the demon, everyone was making it to the House and Feli had found Zheng and-

A third flashback, himself sitting by Feliciano’s bedside in the House but Feli had _died-_

He didn’t remember that, and he couldn’t recall anyone telling him about it. He could have lived without knowing.

The Vatican blew up part of the House, _of course_ he would.

Vasco-

“I _won’t_ read this,” Lovino said through clenched teeth, this particular expression of rage familiar to him as the anger of _knowing_ he was going to cry and hating that he couldn’t keep himself from it. “It- Vasco- I _won’t read this!_ ”

“You don’t have to,” Antonio told him, holding him gently around his waist. Across the table, England was also fighting to keep his composure. “ _Caro,_ no, you don’t have to.”

Antonio had read already, and Lovino wasn’t going to read any more, and he wasn’t about to let Zell pick up the book-

Ludwig reached over and slid it in front of him.

“It’s going to be okay,” he heard Antonio say quietly, and Lovino was wheezing like he was trying to avoid his usual loud, messy crying.

Ludwig skipped the rest of Vasco’s death scene, and read out the Nations in the House driving the demon away, then skipped the next scene, because it was Lovino and Antonio again.

A single-sentence section, a little later, made him stop as he tried to puzzle it over.

“What now?” Norway asked.

“ _‘After the darkness and the fall, Feliciano woke in an inferno and torment, utterly alone’_ ,” Ludwig read. “That sounds like…”

He looked over at Lovino, because if anyone knew all the details of Feliciano’s time in the House, it was his brother.

Lovino wouldn’t look at him, and his gut twisted up.

“This _can’t_ be what it sounds like,” he said. “Lovino- _Romano._ ”

“He didn’t want to me say anything,” Lovino told them after a moment, still not looking up. His voice was still raw and rough from the shock and grief of running across his son’s murder.

“ _Zio-_ ” Heinrich started to say, fear hiding in the edges of his tone- but he couldn’t manage to finish the thought.

 _Feliciano is all right,_ Ludwig told himself. _I saw him today. It’s a flashback scene, and that was just after the war. He **came back.**_

He got to the phone conversation the two of them had had, would have, himself outside in the snow and Feli in the House, and desperately wanted Feli _here._ It felt so strange, narrating about himself like he was a different person, and this had so clearly been a private conversation.

Promises of love, Feliciano telling him how to _have a healthy grieving process,_ refusing to promise that he’d come back, come out-

_I’ll **always** come back for you, Spatzi._

“You don’t have to-”

“I can handle this!” he half-snapped back at Erzsébet, and kept reading.

He _could_ do this. He’d had worse things happen to him. Today, for one.

He wanted Feli. He wanted Nia. He wanted Gilbert.

In the story, the history, the future they’d have eventually, Cassiel used magic to heal Zheng and hurt himself in the process, and Lovino tore his brother’s name out the demon’s book and went down to the grandfather clock to challenge the monster.

Feliciano promised his soul to the demon, and Ludwig’s heart broke.

 _It didn’t happen,_ he told himself as he forced his way through the words. _It didn’t happen it didn’t happen Feli is **here** the demon couldn’t take him, couldn’t keep him-_

 _‘It says ‘Italia’!’_ Lovino screamed out from the past at the demon, preserved on paper. _‘_ _Here we are, hellspawn! Italy is here, both of us, and we are going **back!** ’_

 _“Lovino,”_ Antonio said, sounding horrified.

“I _had to!_ ” Lovino told him heatedly. “I couldn’t just fucking _let it_ take him!”

Ludwig looked up from the book to meet his eyes.

“Thank you,” he said, and Lovino looked away.

“Yeah, well, whatever,” he muttered. Ludwig interpreted the _‘we’re family, that’s what you do’_ just fine.

Feliciano asked Cristoforo for last rites, and Ludwig had to read through his husband’s litany of sins.

_‘I have lied and broken vows… I have broken vows and promises. I have murdered- strangers, friends, and family. I have assisted in murder; many, many times, knowingly and without remorse… I have treated with a demon-’_

“ _‘And I have’_ ,” Ludwig read out, and his tongue tied itself up in knots as he registered the next words.

_Spatzi, no, **why-**_

“ _‘And I have loved a man’_ ,” he forced himself to say aloud, and _felt_ everyone else collectively flinch.

Feliciano declared himself in violation of the Sacrament of Marriage and why why why _why would he **say** that_ had he really thought that all this time-

_‘“Please,” he whispered. “Please, Cristoforo, he’s terrible at emotions I know he’s not religious but he needs someone **please** I just want him to be happy even if I’m not- if I can’t-”’_

The love of his life called himself _‘unforgivable’_ and the only thing Cristoforo could say to him was to make sure that he told Nia and Heinrich that they were loved and-

“Ludwig,” Roderich said.

“I can _do this,_ ” Ludwig insisted through the dripping tears. He wiped them away, and tried to relax the muscles in his throat that were tensing up from the effort of holding back the rest.

In that future-past morning, Feliciano led everyone out of the House, then turned on his heel and walked right back in as his family yelled after him to come back to come back, to stop-

Cristoforo took him to the Vatican, and in the late dark hours of the night, Lovino had been awake to meet Feli when he came back to life.

This was fine. This was fine. Nia and Heinrich and Feli had made it out alive, and _again_ someone was trying to tell him he didn’t have to read, but he was oddly calm now.

“That was the end of the chapter,” he said. “The next one is January.”

January- where Nico was engaged to the daughter of a Camorra boss, and half-kicked out of the family, Gilbert threatened Keld Schumacher on his behalf while his sister plotted more ways to get information on them, and he and Feli didn’t talk.

“April.”

Belarus died. He and Feli couldn’t hold a conversation. Cuba killed Salcedo and declared himself President, setting himself up as the latest in a string of dictators. And the Netherlands, smoking loose tobacco and telling Keld Schumacher about all the betrayals of a Nation’s long life.

 _‘You’re all suspicious backstabbing murderous bastards who are trying **not** to be,’ _ was how Falko had described them, and their children were here. Ludwig hadn’t wanted his children to hear that. But at some point, all of them- the Nations- had decided that humanity should know. This had been included on purpose.

_‘And it’s better to trust the ones who know how much it hurts than the ones who don’t.’_

At some point, they’d decided that _‘better to trust’_ didn’t mean _‘couldn’t trust’_ for everyone else.

“May.”

Rhee Eun blew up Tai and China. Everyone panicked and fretted over Cuba, when they should have worried about the secrets Cassiel had been keeping, and the fact that Ásdís and Øystein hadn’t thought they could trust their family with the news that Cassiel had been dealing with the Pict. Hanna Schumacher-

 _‘Letting Germany get his filthy hands on the government’_. _‘Nazi scum’_.

People… they were allowed to hate him.

“September.”

Timestamps. That was new.

Zell was having a baby. She was going to have a _baby._

He was going to be a grandfather.

_‘At 3:58 and 36 seconds PM Central European Summer Time, Hanna Schumacher tabbed onto an international news website and sat, waiting.’_

_‘Germany?’_

_‘Germany!’_

“Germany?”

 _‘Crumple’_.

* * *

“….Sebastian?”

The Hunt had taken by the little detached house in Kharad to make a quick pack- clothes, personal items, hygienic necessities- and then shoved the three of them into Sebastian and Maria’s shared set of rooms in the Jagdshall, so they were away from everything else.

It wasn’t _that_ far away. Sebastian knew that they were keeping the old Nations and the human family he’d never really met in the War Room, just down the hall. And High Command had taken over the Court Gallery, two rooms and the Gallery grand staircase away.

But no one was paying attention to them.

He was trying not to be hurt, because _Dyadya_ Vanya and _Mère_ and Arik and Isolde and Michele had to keep the Hunt and the _Großjagdsreich_ going, and Reno and Nadri’s parents had Venice and Póli Thálassas to hold together. Governments were important.

But _Elti_ was gone and Maria had run away and he wanted someone to cry with.

If any of them _would_ cry about a witch. Cassiel Navin had been family too, and no one was upset about him.

It still didn’t feel right, thinking of Maria as a witch. But the Jagdsprinz _had_ said she was the one to mess everything up, and Mosè was the one who was in charge of all the law things and if he heard what Maria had done and immediately gone to witchcraft- he was the expert.

“What?” he asked, looking over to Reno. He was still sitting at Sebastian’s desk, where he’d taken out some paper and started writing something.

Now, he stood, and handed him three separately-folded sheaves of paper.

“Could you deliver these, please?” Reno asked. He sounded weirdly calm, and Sebastian didn’t _like_ that. “I have to go turn myself in.”

 _“What?”_ Sebastian exclaimed, and refused to take the papers- letters? “For _what- you_ didn’t do anything!”

The calm slipped a little, and Sebastian wasn’t sure what that expression was. It looked something like sadness.

“Yes I did,” Reno said, voice very, very quiet. “The- the stories. I talked a little to Ravenna. She told me that her uncle sent a confession to the Kharad Auxiliary. _He_ summoned the demon. But he said that something was _forcing_ him, and- I wrote a story for Germany to come back! I wrote a story so that the Auxiliary would figure out who killed that üldrene in Kharad, and he confessed to having _that_ done, too! He did it on the _right day,_ Sebastian! And Ahes- she said we all had a little bit of star and stars are creation and Maria created a whole separate _universe_ but _I_ created _this_ universe a place where Béutros Saab _was forced to commit witchcraft._ And that’s- forcing people _is_ witchcraft. It’s- it’s _Disenthaid._ ”

“No!” Nadri snarled. “You didn’t mean to do any of that!”

“But _it happened,_ ” Reno said. “People got hurt. There’s debts owed. The universe is _wrong._ Maria’s part of it and the demon was part of it and I’m the third part. The demon got killed and Maria ran away so she wouldn’t have to pay-”

“If she stayed they’d have to _kill her!_ ” Sebastian cut him off, appalled. “She made a mistake! They can’t kill her for that!”

Reno _looked_ at him.

“You’re the Jagdsprinz’s son,” he said. “I’m the Princess of Póli Thálassas. We _both_ know better.”

“Fine!” Sebastian exclaimed, suddenly _angry._ “Fine! So they _can!_ That doesn’t mean they _should!_ That doesn’t mean they should be _allowed!_ ”

“Lives are owed lives,” Reno said, voice shaky. “I hurt Béutros Saab in a way that nothing can make up for. The üldrene that got murdered is my fault, even though I didn’t do it. The demon killed people, and it wouldn’t have been there if I hadn’t messed around with magic I didn’t really know anything about. And Cassiel Navin got out, I bet _that_ was the demon. And I’m pretty sure the demon got Ravenna’s parents and Rosario. I’m pretty sure I got my fiancée’s family _killed._ And, Sebastian- I’m pretty sure I got your _Elti_ killed, too. My life is the most I have to give and it’s not enough.”

“That’s not your fault!”

“It _is!_ Everybody else in this situation was reacting to other things that happened! _I_ wasn’t reacting to anything when I wrote those story-spells! _I_ wasn’t trying to protect myself! _I_ just wanted to see if I could do it! And no one _made me try that!_ I’m Princess of Póli Thálassas, and I _have to go._ ”

Sebastian still hadn’t taken the letters, so Reno dropped them onto the desk and headed for the door. Sebastian reached for him, to grab him and maybe shake some sense into him-

“Maria was reacting,” Reno told him, looking him dead in the eye as he tried to stop him. “We were in that situation because of me. If all the blame comes back to me, then the Hunt can’t kill your sister.”

He wanted to say that he let Reno go out the door to turn himself in because he was stunned. But the flash-thought of _good Maria shouldn’t die_ couldn’t be ignored, no matter if he felt guilty about thinking it or not.

Nadri was sitting on the bed, and now she was tensed up all over, staring at the door her brother had walked out of.

“So he’s Princess of Póli Thálassas,” she said after a moment. Sebastian couldn’t tell if it was for herself, or him. “If he dies, _I’ll_ be Princess. I’d be a horrible Princess. And he’s my brother, and he’s always looked out for me. And _Mamma_ and _Mítera_ would be upset. Ties of obligation. Family and Kingdom.”

“If the Hunt decides to kill him-” Sebastian started to say, dread roiling his stomach. They _shouldn’t_ decide to kill him, it wasn’t Reno’s _fault,_ not really, it wasn’t like Cassiel Navin who’d _decided_ to kill people and then done it.

She looked over at him.

“Yeah, I’ll be defying the Hunt,” she said. “And Reno won’t run. He’s convinced they _should_ kill him. But they can’t convince _me._ ”

She bared the steel teeth Maria had made for her.

“They’ll have to get _through me_ first. I’ll _kill them_.”

Then _she_ left, and Sebastian was left standing there in the middle of his room, staring at nothing.

Nadri would fight the Hunt, kill Jäger, to keep them from Reno.

He didn’t want Maria to die. Would _he_ do that? _Could_ he do that?

 _Maria ran away,_ he reminded himself.

But if she hadn’t. If she’d heard that word _‘witchcraft’_ but stayed and let Mosè take her-

_I’d grab her and run._

Reno and Nadri had grown up visiting Martigny, and knowing them; but they hadn’t _lived_ here. They weren’t the Jagdsprinz’s children. All four of them might be related to people in the Hunt, but they were only really his and Maria’s _family._

And Sebastian wouldn’t fight family. Not like that. Maria wouldn’t either.

_Please be okay, Maria. Please be somewhere the Hunt will never find you._

* * *

Kiku got up from his seat and walked around the table to where his friend was sitting, and firmly took the book away.

“…the Reichstag,” Ludwig whispered. “The Chancellery. They hacked the emergency services so they couldn’t- _Tiergarten burned._ ”

“That’s not even a year from now,” Heinrich said, arms wrapped around his stomach. “We’ve only got-”

“Nations don’t _die_ like that!” Zell exploded, anger taking over in place of sorrow. “That’s not how it _works_ sure the Chancellor and the Reichstag were gone but the _rest_ of the government was still intact and all the people were still there and no one had _conquered_ anything-”

Ludwig reached over and pulled her down into a hug, made uncomfortable by the position. Zell clutched as his shirt, and Heinrich scooted close enough to press up against them.

_Too much death today._

Kiku silently read through the rest of the chapter to see if they could skip anything. The other human children exchanged awkward looks which simply _shouted_ how horribly uncomfortable they were with being in this situation, while their parents skillfully pretended that nothing was happening- and that even if something _was_ happening, they weren’t there.

He got to the end of the chapter, having managed to avoid betraying any emotion the entire time, and then looked at the beginning of the next.

Some of this could be skipped. But one thing-

Kiku walked over to Austria and held the book between the man and Hungary, so Austria was the only one who could see it, and pointed to the relevant section.

Austria’s mouth compressed into a thin line, and he looked away.

True, then- so where to start.

“I do not believe it is necessary to read out _every_ part of this chapter,” he said to the room. “But there is some vital information. To summarize: _Germanen für Landesstolz_ became de facto government in Berlin, because they were the best-organized to provide relief aid. Prussia refused to explain what was going on, until-”

_‘Let me tell you a story.’_

Kiku read out the secret Gilbert had kept for centuries, Heinrich Adler to Johannes, Johannes to Nikolaus, Nikolaus to Ludwig.

Ludwig to Dietrich.

Nia’s rage, Zell’s refusal to believe that that was all there was to this story.

2052 seemed to fly by, in comparison. Politics was easy. Personal was hard.

Honalee was harder.

He didn’t dare look at Ludwig.

 _‘You think_ il Sponsalizio del Mare _is just a bit of traditional pageantry for Ƚa Sènsa, don’t you?’_

On Earth, Miervaldis and Gilbert started to piece together Hanna Schumacher’s conspiracy of silence while Dietrich insulted most of Europe.

Nico was executed by his father-in-law, and Kiku read out the description of how it had felt for him to die, and Lovino glared in self-accusation at the table while Antonio huddled in on himself.

“That’s what he was doing to the demon,” he said, as Kiku narrated the _camorristi_ ’s deaths. “ _That’s_ how he learned-”

Lovino swore under his breath, something in Italian that no one else could quite hear.

Amphitrite Kataiis told Feliciano that Nia would pay the debt he owed to her, for abandoning her; and told him _exactly_ what had happened to Ludwig.

Humanity’s first unconventional space flight, re-meeting the Pict, the Nations deciding that Honalee and magic was the only way to have a _chance_ when the Pict decided to go back on their word, and Mephistopheles joined Honalee and Earth as the Hunt bore down on it.

“ _‘So that’s how the rest of Italy died,’ the Jagdsprinz said,’_ ” Kiku read out, and stopped speaking to read ahead.

No. No- Ludwig and Zell and Heinrich didn’t need to know these details.

He looked up from the book.

“I’m sorry, Ludwig,” he told his friend. “She killed him.”

The demon killed, a family destroyed; and Kiku closed the book and put it away.

* * *

The messenger from Cíbola arrived, distraught and rattled, around three o’clock in the afternoon by the clocks in Martigny.

“I tried to beat the news from the King, Marschall Braginski, Marschall Lord Hiruz” the messenger told him miserably. “I _swear,_ I tried.”

“You beat it _here,_ Leutnantkommandant,” he told her. “Sit down. Where is the message?”

“Didn’t wait for anyone to write it down,” she said, and didn’t sit. She took up parade rest instead. “I’m the one who took General Lusk’s press release to Honalee to the King of Chicomoztoc. The kings of the other Cities were at Court because everyone already knew that _something_ had happened, and after the King had the news read out- they all-”

“Breathe.”

“The King of Chicomoztoc _looked_ at me and asked if it was really true what Ereshkigal had done to the Domdruc and the Silent Hills,” she said, and swallowed nervously as she glanced at Lord Hiruz. “And _I_ said that the Jagdsprinz had said it was, so then _he_ said: _‘When Ereshkigal came to the Five Cities, she told us that we could not survive without a King. We knew that the Tylwyth Teg were moving from Avalon- our histories say that they had already begun raiding the coast of the Hills and establishing villages. Ereshkigal said that a King would protect us from them. None of the Cities wanted to be subordinate to the others, so we negotiated that the Kingship would pass between us, on a set schedule. She lied, our negotiations are invalid. The Kingdom of Chicomoztoc is declared void; we shall be the Five Cities once more.’_ ”

Ivan frowned, and looked to Lord Hiruz.

“There are rules,” he said. “That is _not_ how Kingship works. The Jagdsprinz has not…”

What _would_ the Jagdsprinz be able to do in this situation? Nia had been able to transfer Kingship from one person to another, with Odette and Afallach, but she hadn’t ever _destroyed_ a position. Gwyn ap Llud had, with Ahes, but he’d _killed_ her to do it, and she hadn’t had a Prince or Princess to take over for her. Even then-

The Jagdsprinz had said that Maria was the Sun. Ahes had been the Sun. It sounded as though the power of the position hadn’t been destroyed, just left unattended.

Lord Hiruz shifted uncomfortably.

“They have not tried to _abolish_ the position,” he said. “Or put someone else in place. They are simply… _ignoring_ that it still exists. If there is mutual agreement that the contract that grouped the Five Cities into Chicomoztoc has ceased to be binding, or that the position of King has ceased to hold value, that is their prerogative. The King of Chicomoztoc still _exists._ It is just that he confines his authority to Cíbola.”

“But the Jagdsprinz-”

“The Jagdsprinz is not like other Kings,” Lord Hiruz told him. “The Jagdsprinz has an _intrinsic_ duty that cannot be violated without consequences and wider repercussions by whomever holds the position. The other Kings have more discretion. It is the Jagdsprinz’s right and responsibility to declare when a King’s discretion on how they rule violates their duties. Without the Jagdsprinz- it is Ereshkigal’s decision. The Five Cities have left their agreement on the only technicality they have. Should Ereshkigal hear of it-”

“Do they realize,” Ivan said, trying not to get too frustrated. They _had_ been expecting things to fall apart, after all. Just not like this. “That there is no one who can protect them?”

“Ereshkigal indirectly threatened them with _Distawydwr_ to accept a King,” Lord Hiruz pointed out, and blinked once, long and slow- a sign of mild amusement. “And they declared their contract ended immediately after hearing that Ereshkigal had banished the one person who could stand against her, and would back their decision no matter the time or circumstances. They know. They have simply refused to be afraid.”

Ivan frowned at him slightly, and then looked at the messenger.

“You said you tried to come ahead of the news.”

“The King was sending his decision down in written form to the other Courts,” the messenger told him.

“Go inform General Lusk to monitor the spread of information, Leutnantkommandant. Dismissed.”

The messenger hurried from the room, and Ivan sighed.

“ _‘They have simply refused to be afraid’_?” he asked. “Let me ask you this, Lord Hiruz- have _you_ refused to be afraid? When the Irvinrkallrene meets this evening in Nysa, should I expect to hear that the Domdruc have refused a King as well?”

Lord Hiruz’s ears twitched.

“I will make no promises,” he said eventually. “But Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor always respected us. Should she return, I believe that my people would not be amiss to leaving the situation as it has stood for these seven centuries. Should she not…”

No words for a moment.

“Well, there shall be another meeting. And I will remind the others, if necessary, that the Hunt has made their home here too; and that while the _Hunt_ may no longer exist, the people who were Jäger have. And that we have long taken in humans who have no place to return to.”

It would be a peaceful end, at least. Ivan tried not to brood on it as they got back to work, imposing order and a sense of security on nervous officers who either came to see them in person, or who called in from their postings across the galaxy; and coordinated the Hunt’s efforts to stay in control.

The messenger from Nicnevin’s Court came sometime after five-thirty. He wasn’t Jäger, but one of the Court Guard.

“The Queen has sent to me to inform you that many of the nobles in her Court have taken the situation with Ereshkigal, and Chicomoztoc’s decision, to heart,” he told them. “They ask what value Ereshkigal’s words can hold; and why, if the Jagdsprinz is gone and the Hunt cannot ride; and if Chicomoztoc can chose to discard their King; why they cannot be rid of a Queen they have never liked or wanted. The Hills are in open rebellion over the legitimacy of Queen Nicnevin’s position. It is civil war.”

The Silent Hills were right on the border of the Jägerskov, and war was _illegal,_ but the Hunt didn’t have the capability to do anything about it right now. Lord Hiruz went off to the forest to warn the border harkene and the little ex-slave human village in the low grassy hills just outside the forest about the fighting, and call out all the _Drakräder,_ part of the Hunt or not, to be on watch.

Ivan sent out orders to remove some Jäger from regular patrol around the Jägerskov to go with them, and to guard the road into Nysa. They’d look for refugees, if there were any, and figure out what to do when they came. He also sent a message to Odette, to tell her of the danger to her grandmother and the people in Graig Bryn Du.

Odette arrived, holding down fear, only a few minutes before Reno came down the grand staircase in the Court Gallery to present his papers, and turn himself in for witchcraft.

* * *

It was dark out when János woke up, but Árpád was there, and they had a nice long hug before János even _thought_ about getting out of the guest bed he’d been given in the Jagdshall.

“ _Nagymama_ and _Nagyapa_ went to Prarayer with the others a couple of hours ago,” Árpád told him as he convinced himself to leave the warmth of the bed. “And Jacques said that General Beilschmidt is having- he took charge of getting the bodies moved from Kharad. I don’t know where you and Lana had thought about a place for Verity, but-”

“We never,” János started to say, and swallowed the lump in his throat. “We hadn’t decided yet. And I don’t know what Lana would have wanted. But her mother and grandfather are here. I should ask them.”

“They’re not the ones who really knew her, _Apa_.”

“They saw her die,” János reminded them. “And they’re her family to. I would feel wrong not asking. But if they don’t mind- I’d like the horse farm.”

Árpád thought about it while he forced himself to get out of bed. He didn’t _want_ to have a multi-person funeral. He didn’t want to think about it.

“There are a couple places that could work on the farm,” they said after a minute or two. “I could show you.”

No, there was something else he had to deal with.

“Where’d Edward?” he asked.

Árpád had to stop and think.

“I don’t actually know,” they told him. “High Command left pretty quickly. But I think he stayed in Kharad with Vasco.”

He’d call. In a bit.

“How long-”

“It’s seven-thirty,” Árpád said. “Half a day? That’s okay, Marschall Braginski ordered Nico off-duty to go to sleep and the way I heard it, he fell asleep on the couch in his office over lunch and he didn’t wake up when his Leutnantkommandant poked him and talked really loudly. We’ll probably see him again tomorrow morning. He was keeping the demon busy _all by himself._ ”

Yeah, sleep a lot after that. János could go back to sleep, himself, except-

“How have people reacted?”

“Marschall Braginski wants to see you,” Árpád told him, and got him walking down the hall to the stairs that would take them to the Court Gallery before giving a straight answer. “Amphitrite escorted Ahes to Kêr-Is, and Ahes made a promise to get things fixed, to the _angry ghosts_ there. I thought the angry ghosts were Honalenier stories, like the High Legends.”

Right. Find a Disrägner who could keep quiet, and ask about how to placate angry ghosts.

“Lord Hiruz says that without the Jagdsprinz- we have to really careful about promises and contracts and such. They’re absolute. It’s like the story of how Gwyn ap Llud became Jagdsprinz in the first place.”

And brush up on history. He didn’t really know how Honalee had operated before the Jagdsprinz.

“Honalee isn’t happy. Most of the Kings and Courts and Kingdoms just seem shocked, but Chicomoztoc dissolved itself on some sort of legal technicality about non-acknowledgement. Lord Hiruz understands it, but I still don’t really get what the difference is- anyway. And the Silent Hills have finally gone to war over Queen Nicnevin.”

Oh no.

“There aren’t-”

“The _Drakräder_ are out watching for _Distawydwr,_ and helping to hold the border with the Jäger,” Árpád told him bleakly. “But we don’t have the means to wade in and _stop_ them. Domdruc Filfaraskind got recalled from Kharad to assume temporary promotion and command on the border, since Emma is still in the hospital. They think she’ll be out in a couple of days, but she won’t be on field duty for a while. Humanity seems to be holding it together, but partially I think it’s because of the Pict.”

Of course. _Of course_ the Pict would move _now._ Earth and humanity had been holding the Jagdsprinz and the Hunt against them for seven centuries. The Jagdsprinz had foiled their plan to set up humanity to fall for stealing the Ramman’s empire. If they’d had any other plans for humanity, they’d been foiled.

And now humanity had lost its best protection.

“They haven’t _done_ anything yet,” Árpád said, noticing János’s alarmed expression. “But Serafina diAngeli is… upset. About the Residence. And Nanshe won’t talk to anyone. General Eisenhart has Brioclite on high alert, and Marschall Braginski gave her field command of Theiostea, Oqxyama, Oskapus, Trojana, and Jelea. And Helike has a standing order that she’s to take over there too, if the Pict move.”

Helike had been made the capital of the Imperial Human State because it didn’t have the history Haero had, and it was just about as far away from the Republican Confederacy as you could get, and still be in human space. But it was _just_ behind what would be the front lines of any war with the Pict.

János fervently hoped they had some sort of evacuation plan for the government. Helike was the most populated planet after Earth- they couldn’t save the civilian populace. But if there was going to be any real resistance to the Pict, the Imperial State _had_ to hold, somewhere.

“And,” Árpád said quietly, as they stepped into the Court Gallery. The third of the room with the grand staircase and throne had been blocked off, and a number of tables brought in to create a command center for Ivan and Lord Hiruz. “This isn’t to be spread around. But Reno turned himself in for inadvertent witchcraft and as a _Disenthaider._ And Maria is wanted- officially for to answer some questions, but also on witchcraft. _She’s_ the reason everything-”

They made a pretty vague hand motion, but János understood. There was only other thing that had been big enough today for _‘everything’_.

But… _how?_

No, let the Hunt worry about that part.

Ivan noticed their arrival, and sent Árpád to manage the room while he and Lord Hiruz pulled him aside.

“The Jagdsprinz,” he said. “Nia. Could she still be alive?”

“There’s no body?”

“Maria has not returned.”

“You didn’t try the Hounds?”

Ivan got a look on his face like he was calling himself an idiot in his head.

“We shall ask Arik tomorrow,” Lord Hiruz said. “But the Jagdsprinz, Sorcerer Héderváry?”

“I’m not really a soul-healer,” János told them, crossing his arms. “No one is. The information gets passed down, but it’s so rare that anyone ever _needs_ one- no one has any practice. But I know the theory. You can recover on your own from a little damage. It’s probably not _pleasant,_ but a little damage will… scab over, I guess. And then heal. You _can_ regrow soul-essence that’s been torn out. But we only know about those little bits of damage. Attacks to the soul, if they’re massively damaging or fatal-”

He looked to Ivan.

“Well, you remember how fast Germany went? Probably even less than minute from attack to collapse, and he didn’t really… that was just the memories. It was about a minute from when the Jagdsprinz was completely gone to when she couldn’t stand any longer, and that fire- she was _burning her own soul-essence_ to do that, because that was easiest. It was bleeding out everywhere already, and it was _hers_ in a way that ambient magic taken and used can never be. That was six or seven hours ago. If she hasn’t come back yet-”

He didn’t want it to be true, and he didn’t want to say it; but he couldn’t see how it could go any other way.

“She’s dead,” János told them. “You might never get a body. But her soul was too close to dissociating for me to save. Maria wouldn’t have been able to do it. _Maybe_ if Sebastian had grabbed her, or if she’d taken him and Reno with her wherever she went. I know what they did to Nadri, but that _did_ take a lot of planning and preparation. I’d say Ereshkigal could have saved her- she made the Jagdsprinz, after all. But she didn’t. She knew _exactly_ what that would do to Nia. She _wanted_ Nia gone. Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor is dead.”


	11. Dying Light

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Got some content warnings:  
> -discussion of torture and associated trauma  
> -implications of attempted suicide

“Oh God,” Nico said halfway through breakfast the morning after everything, and put down his silverware. His wife and Ivan and Arik looked over at him. A number of the other Jäger taking the morning meal in the Officer’s Mess, on the far end of the Jagdshall’s west wing, glanced over as well, but quickly looked away again.

Everyone was acting oddly today.

“What?” Diana asked him.

 _“Yesterday,”_ Nico said, fighting the urge to get out of his seat and run to Prarayer and try to do some immediate damage control. “I was panicking and I was stressed and I wasn’t thinking clearly and when I was putting everyone in the War Room Heinrich asked me for answers and I just- _I gave them the book._ ”

“ _The_ book?”

“I _gave them_ Schumacher’s book and then _I_ _walked away!_ ” Nico said, horrified with his past self. **_“Shit!_ ”**

“Well,” Ivan said after a moment. “They did have to be told, and at least this way it was not face-to-face.”

“I shouldn’t have done that!”

“No, you should not have,” Ivan told him, sounding surprisingly uncritical. “This is why I forced you off-duty. This is a fixable mistake. There are things that you could have done that would _not_ be. Though, I believe it would be a well-advised move to go see them. To check on them.”

“And someone has to tell them about _Elti_ ,” Arik said quietly, and Nico winced for an entirely different reason than shame.

“I’ll do it,” he volunteered reluctantly. He didn’t _want_ to, but he already had to go down anyway- oh. “Has anyone told Venice? Or the General? The Vatican?”

Ivan sighed. Answer enough.

“I’ll talk to them too,” Nico said. Diana squeezed his knee under the table. What order to go in?

He’d never had to do house calls. He had a vague concept about how this sort of thing worked- old still memories of movies where somber men in uniform turned up at the door, hat under arm, and the mother started crying as soon as she saw him-

There was nothing that said he had to do it _alone._ Nico decided that he’d bring János, to explain the technical bits. They could go to _Zio_ Cris first. _He’d_ know how to do this.

* * *

Odette was sleeping in, probably not on purpose- she’d been sleeping since before János had woken up the evening before, and Ivan thought that she’d probably taken some sleeping pills to go to bed and _stay_ in bed.

He didn’t want to wake her, but he had to make sure that he got the news in before she went to talk to anyone.

“Odette,” he said, shaking her gently. “Odette.”

She stirred, making a soft sleepy noise, and then woke all at once. She turned slightly, looking over her shoulder at him.

“Did you hear from Grandmother?” she asked immediately, pulling the sheets up a little further.

“No,” Ivan told her, wishing that it was. She’d left orders to be told immediately if there was any news about her grandmother, and he did hope that Nicnevin came through it all alive. Even giving up the war and fleeing to Martigny in exile, and the political situation that would entail, would be preferable to having to give this news. “It is about Nia-”

Odette froze under his hand.

“If she was back,” she whispered, eyes going watery. “She’d be here waking me up herself.”

“I know,” Ivan said, letting all the grief he’d been having to hide in public show. “I know, Odette. I am so sorry.”

He moved his hand as Odette sat up, dragging the covers with her to wrap around herself.

“You do not have to get up just yet. We are keeping things quiet-”

“No,” Odette cut him off, sniffing back tears. “No. I’m the acting ruler of the _Großjagdsreich_ right now. We’ve lost our Emperor, no matter if most people don’t know. I _should_ be up. I have to be up.”

* * *

Somehow, he’d actually managed to fall asleep. Eventually.

It false dawn when he woke up. Gilbert and Feli might complai-

They’d always complained, but it hadn’t been _really_ complaining, about the early hours he kept. It was teasing, or a light making-fun; but even for him, this was too early to be up without anything to get out of bed for.

He couldn’t stay in bed, he realized. Not alone. Not now.

Someone had washed his clothes in the night, and left them clean and folded for him just inside the door of the little seating area that connected his bedroom to the room Zell and Rémy were sharing. It was a little unnerving, and more than enough impetus to get him to leave the room and start walking, trying to find _somewhere_ in this building that didn’t seem strange, _wrong-_

But it was all rich wood designs, and precious metal and stone inlays, and expensive masonry, and furnishings that fit no styles he knew but did fit a mindset, a purpose, he knew.

It was meant to say _‘power’_ , and _‘influence’_ , and _‘glory’_. You were meant to see it and be a little intimidated and a lot impressed. You were supposed to be mildly distracted by the grandeur and luxuriousness of it, so you’d let your guard down, or not want to start trouble in the first place. This was supposed to be _‘look at what we can afford to spend’_ and _‘look at what we can make people do, building all this’_ and _‘you may have power but not power like **this** ’_.

He didn’t like it. It was fine in restored buildings, then it was history; and it was fine in the still working palaces and castles in the places that had kept their monarchies, that was tradition; but this was _new,_ this was-

Nia had had this built.

Ludwig was walking fast enough that only precision of movement kept it from being a run. At least these were hardwood floors, not marble; and the rugs over the plainer flooring were fine wool, not silk or velvet or something. He came to a stop in some sort of atrium area, only noticing because the rugs stopped and the plainer parquetry gave way to a massive, finely-executed and -detailed sun-in-glory in more colors of wood than he’d ever seen in one place in his entire life. The wood was accented by some warm golden-colored bits of stone, and the centerpiece of the sun was a polished, flawless chunk of amber. The walls were painted in warm cream, and the crown and baseboard molding had decorations picked out in inlaid bronze or brass or gold and weren’t there _any other colors_ in this place but cream and gold and brown with bits of black and grey and red thrown in?

There were double doors on the other side of the atrium and he took the few short strides across it to push the wood-and-brass-and-stained-glass affairs open.

Beyond was a ballroom, with marquetry walls with more stone insets- malachite and porphyry were added to the options here _, finally,_ some other color- and a massive crystal chandelier and the floor was polished stone but one end of the ballroom showed the lightening sky over mountains and an Alpine lake in beautifully panoramic windows.

He walked over and sat down in the outward curve of the panoramic windows, drawing his knees up to chest to watch the sun rise.

His mind wandered, even though the whole point of the walk was to try to keep it in one place. Now that he’d stopped walking, everything else had just… stopped with him.

Everything was a burden on his heart, and weight in his ribs. He didn’t want to think about Nia, but Feli-

Sometimes he’d half-expected to get cheated on. Not often, and it was rarely much more than a few moment’s anxiety about the mismatch of his _‘asexual, sex-repulsed’_ and Feli’s decidedly _‘not’_ on both counts; but Feli had always told him that he didn’t want an open relationship.

He knew it hurt Ludwig to offer that, he’d said. Feli had said he didn’t want to hurt him.

Ludwig could have dealt with cheating to satisfy sexual urges. He had a plan thought out for addressing that, down to every nuance or point of conversation he could think of. He’d done best-case and worst-case scenarios, and accounted as best he could for emotional reactions on both sides. It was a good plan. It was a flexible plan. Adaptable.

Just… not for this.

No one ever expected to be the- the _‘other woman’_ in a relationship.

They were _married._ There had been courtship, decades of it. They had _children._ They’d come through parenting and de-Nationing and re-Nationing and Zell’s personal crisis and Heinrich’s conversion together.

In the romance novels he read, this was the part where the heroine would be crying picturesquely, asking herself in her heartbreak if the man she’d been with had ever _really_ loved her, if it had all been lie.

Ludwig almost wished he could do that.

But the tears wouldn’t come, and he was pretty sure numbness wasn’t heartbreak, and there was a lot he wasn’t sure of right now but he _knew_ in a way that defied any doubt that Feli loved him, had always meant every word of friendship and affection and love, and none of it had been manipulation or lies or anything but total heartfelt honesty and sincerity. Feliciano _loved him,_ and there was nothing he could ever possibly do that would destroy that.

He’d already done his worst, after all, and none of that had even shaken Feliciano’s dedication to caring about him. The one thing he could always be certain of was that love.

Which left him at _‘why’,_ and that took too much energy; because Feliciano definitely hadn’t done it to hurt anyone so _why._

He just wanted to lie down and never have to get back up again, or think.

Ludwig didn’t know exactly how long he was there, half his mind blank and the other half going in numb sluggish circles without coming up with any answers, before Antonio appeared. The sun had come all the way up, at least.

“I followed you out of the wing,” Antonio freely admitted. Ludwig wasn’t looking at him, but he could hear the hint of sheepish smile. “I was already up. Really, I’m surprised I managed to fall asleep at _all_ last night. But you looked like you needed some space, so I kept exploring for a bit. There are some really nice stone stairs over there and great ceremonial hallway at the bottom. I made it all the way to the front doors, and let me tell you I haven’t seen tapestries that good since-”

Ludwig let him chatter on about the palace. After a while, he either ran out of things to talk about or realized that Ludwig wasn’t really listening to him.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked gently, after a minute or so of silence.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to- but his brother-in-law’s husband wasn’t known for being judgmental, or pushy, or anything but a great person to talk to.

“I want my family back,” was an easy enough thing to admit, at least.

“Yeah,” Antonio said softly. “Yeah, me too.”

Ludwig shifted just enough to look at him sideways. _He_ hadn’t been lied to for the entirety of a relationship. None of _his_ children had killed Lovino.

“I mean,” Antonio elaborated. “Not like _you_ mean. But- it’s just, it’s Nico. I spent most of yesterday morning watching him hold off a _demon_ by doing nothing more than sitting there and looking at it. And then I found out that he’s _died-_ he’s been _executed._ And he’s part of the Hunt. He said he was a _general_ and there was all that about trying to keep a whole galaxy and empire together-”

“ _Nia’s_ empire,” Ludwig said, sick to his stomach.

“Oh,” Antonio said, in response to his tone. “No, Ludwig, I don’t think it’s like that. I don’t know a whole lot about the Hunt, but I’m pretty sure the sort of empire you’re thinking of _couldn’t_ be made by a Jagdsprinz. That’s not what it’s about.”

Even a little information was better than the nothing he had, though Ludwig wasn’t really convinced.

“She built this,” he said. “She- _Feli._ She was so angry. And yesterday. I don’t- I don’t think I know who she _is_ any longer. I don’t-”

Oh. So he _could_ cry over something _._ He squeezed his eyes shut and tipped his head down to hide his face. He could give some thoughts to Antonio, but not _this._

“I don’t think she’s _her,_ any longer.”

Antonio didn’t have an answer to that, immediately.

“Maybe,” he said. “It could be. But- you’re young, Ludwig.”

He _knew_ that.

“You’re too young to have really seen any Nations grow up. Nia- and Nico, and János- I don’t remember the date it is right now exactly, but it was 27-something. That’s seven hundred or so years. They’re… all a lot older than you.”

He hadn’t thought about that. Nia was almost five times older than he was.

That shouldn’t have happened.

“That’s the same amount of time between the 1300s and _our_ now. And you definitely change in that amount of time, but I’ve rarely seen or heard of a Nation who turns into someone fundamentally different. I mean, swept up in nationalism or your people or a government is one thing. But actually changing the _person,_ not so much. Really- you’re the only example I can think of right away.”

He wasn’t sure if that was comforting or not.

There was another short stretch of quiet.

“I’m a little… I don’t know, too,” Antonio admitted. “Shaken, maybe? I don’t know what to call it. But it was something sort of stupid, for me, about Nico.”

“What?”

“He didn’t sound right,” Antonio said, and the words were so weighted with sadness that Ludwig looked over at him. The other man was staring out the window, over the lake. “He grew up with Italian. He can manage _Nnapulitano,_ and sometimes he speaks it with Vino or his siblings. It colors his Italian, it’s _supposed_ to, we _all_ sound Neapolitans when we speak Italian, but- I didn’t hear it, when he was talking yesterday. He sounded like a foreigner. Not even from some other part of Italy, but from somewhere else entirely. He _remembered_ it perfectly. He’s fluent. But he’s forgotten how to _speak_ it.”

* * *

János didn’t go to breakfast. He got out of bed and went directly to the Hunt’s Zauber Regiment Headquarters on the Jagdshall grounds.

Every Jäger he passed looked him at strangely. He didn’t puzzle it out until he got to the Regiment Headquarters and one of the officers- who he _knew_ was one of the traditionally-trained Honalenier sorcerers from a respected teaching line- saw him in the entry hall, froze, and _bowed,_ hands in the proper deferential position just below her heart, like she would have if she’d been a civilian, and come across her King.

“Storm-death,” she said clearly, eyes fixed on his shoes.

Oh. Ahes’s lighting and the Jagdsprinz’s smoke, and Belial. There was video, and rumor- people had seen.

He was one of two people ever to kill a demon. _Seelenkind,_ sündeyalacgh, centuries of wandering and refining his skills, the demon, and if it hadn’t already he was sure that _somehow_ it would get out how he’d saved his dying cousins- it was quite possible that _no one_ would ever manage a reputation like his.

“Sorcerer Keskiaev,” János said. “Do you happen to know who would be the best Disrägner to talk to for information on angry ghosts?”

“Forgive me, _mágvhat,_ ” she told him, still not looking up. “But I do not. You would have to ask in Nysa.”

“I’m no King,” he told her uncomfortably, and tried to not notice the way that there were a number of other Hunt sorcerers in the room, Honalenier _and_ human, and that not a one of them was protesting Keskiaev addressing him with the honorific reserved for _Razanásan_.

The silence sounded like High Command trading looks behind Nia’s back at her republicanism, and János quickly thanked Keskiaev and retreated.

Going to Nysa wasn’t much better. People _stared_ at him, and if he looked back, there was a better than fifty-fifty chance that they’d _bow._ At least none of the people he passed tried to stick him with another honor title or an honorific he wasn’t entitled to-

“Please don’t,” János said hurriedly, as he stepped into the biggest of Nysa’s jack-shops, and the owner and customers looked like they were about to continue the trend. “I just want to know who the best person to talk to about angry ghosts is.”

Everyone traded looks.

“Azadran Benärve,” he heard someone say quietly.

“Domdrusk?” János asked, puzzled. The first name was definitely Rinnrdrusk, and he could parse the surname in the same language but it wasn’t formed right-

“ _Kviskdrene_ ,” the shop owner said, sounding reluctant. “She’s _kviskdrene_.”

Well, now János was surprised he’d never heard of her. Split-heritage Domdrusk _could_ happen, if you got two huldrene of different sorts in human-form together during mating season, but that was rare enough. The chemical signals didn’t usually match up, and the likelihood of bearing live children who _stayed_ living after they were bornfrom such a pairing required a lot of lucky chance.

Culturally, they occupied a strange spot. Lucky, certainly, and considered naturally skilled in and inclined towards magic, but… well, you kept them at arm’s length. He’d thought it was superstition, because it was all about being particularly prone to hauntings and spiritual trouble, but that was exactly what he needed right now.

Still, a _kviskdrene_ who was also a Disrägner- he’d clearly missed something.

“Where can I find her?”

He got directions, but still had to ask around as he wandered through the harkrene, looking for the appropriate landmarks.

In the end, she found him. He took a turn around a rock outcropping, and she was there on the footpath, waiting.

 _She_ didn’t bow, and he was happy for that.

“I heard you were looking for me, Sündeyalacgh.”

“I heard you’re the expert on ghosts, Disrägner.”

Azadran cracked a smile, and János had to remind himself that huldrene’s body language was different. That little showing of teeth wasn’t amusement, but an indication that she could be dangerous about it.

Her expression softened- teeth disappearing behind her lips again and strangely-shaped ears swiveling back a tad.

“I heard about Sorceress Kirkland,” she said. “If you’re looking-”

“No,” János cut her off. “No. I hadn’t- yesterday I saw a soul mangled beyond my ability to rescue it, and anything it might leave behind could never possibly be peaceful; and then I was told that Kêr-Is is haunted by a city’s-worth of angry ghosts. I remembered the stories about hauntings after Mephistopheles, and…”

Azadran’s ears twitched.

“If you don’t mind me asking,” she began.

“Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor,” he told her. “What Ereshkigal did to her-”

“She’s dead?” she asked quietly.

János nodded.

“High Command is worried about keeping things stable, so it’s to be kept quiet.”

The _kviskdrene_ didn’t protest this, thankfully. She stayed silent, lips pursed thoughtfully about what he’d said.

“It could have happened,” she said after a few moments. “What, exactly, _did_ the Queen of Irkalla do?”

Since it didn’t seem like they were going anywhere, János moved off the footpath to sit down, so he wouldn’t be blocking anyone else who came by. Azadran sat down with him, and listened as he described what had happened to Nia’s soul.

“My teacher was a young child when the Hunt returned,” she said once he’d finished. “She was apprenticed to _her_ teacher then, and that man was the most ghost-attuned of the Disrägner. He was one of the few who ever dared to go near the ruins of the Jagdshall. I heard the stories about ghosts- no.”

“What?”

“That’s a bad word,” Azadran said. “It’s got connotations that you shouldn’t think of. I heard the stories about the _Hedahrene_ from my teacher, as she told me how to deal with them.”

“What’s the difference?” János asked. “Between a ghost and a- _Hedahe_?”

“ _‘Ghost’_ is imprecise,” Azadran informed him. “It makes you think messy, and assume things from your own folklore that aren’t true, like souls getting _lost_ on the way to death, or not knowing they’re dead. The only thing that keeps a ghost, as you think of it, from leaving, is because they are angry.”

“Unfinished business?”

“ _No._ That- just no.”

She shook her head.

“There are three types of _Hedahrene_ ,” she told him. “ _Hajeboghrene_ , _Haisterboghrene_ , and _Mazageboghrene_. It’s rarest to come across a _Mazageboghe-_ they’re extremely uncommon. Those are peaceful souls, temporarily returned to provide advice, or comfort, or give a warning.”

“Oh- visiting dead Nations,” János said. “Except sometimes they just turn up again to take a look at their capital cities and pester their old friends or enemies for outliving them. And complaining. They like to complain.”

“It sounds similar,” Azadran allowed. “Though _Mazageboghrene_ rarely remain long enough to impart more than a few sentences. _Hajeboghrene_ are the most common sort of _Hedahrene_. They’re probably what you think of when you think of a haunted house. _Hajeboghrene_ aren’t- mostly, they aren’t sentient. Usually they’re the remains of a death curse that didn’t get completed.”

 _Like Verity tried to do,_ János thought, remembering the magical tangle Sebastian had told him about earlier that week. It felt like so much longer ago, even though the heartache was still fresh.

“Those can pull in ambient magic, and it _seems_ like there’s a mind behind what it does, but it’s just the magic reacting to the presence of a soul. The other way you get a _Hajeboghe_ is when a fragment of a soul breaks off when someone’s dying. A little bit of mind will leave behind stray memories that people can wander into. A bit of soul-essence will make the place someone died feel very _strongly_ of another presence, without anything being there. The ripples in the local magic caused by the life-force dissolving count as _Hajeboghrene_ too, even though those take care of themselves within a minute or so. Draugr-”

Azadran paused.

“Draugr are _Hajeboghrene_ as well,” she said. “A witch has to make them, but the body is a part of the soul as well. It’s why you’re supposed to burn bodies, besides that it prevents someone from using your parts for anything. Draugr are the actually dangerous _Hajeboghrene_ , because they can kill you, if they’re newly-made. Still, they’re less dangerous than the witch who made them in the first place.”

“So a _Hajeboghe_ is what the Jagdsprinz would have left,” János said.

“Maybe,” Azadran told him. “It depends.”

Apparently this was more complicated than it seemed.

“On?”

“The Queen of Irkalla put significant magic into damaging her soul like that,” Azadran said. “And the area was probably already very magically-saturated when she did- the demon and Cassiel Navin had just died there, yes? If there was enough for her life-force to draw from, and if the soul-essence fire left enough of an impression- Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor _might_ have become a _Haisterboghe_ , like the dead of Kêr-Is. She would probably be a very strange _Haisterboghe_ , but it could happen.”

János wasn’t totally sure whether the swoop of hope in his chest was warranted or not.

“If she _became_ something,” he said. “Then there would have to be enough of her still to _have_ done something, right? If she-”

“People avoid _Haisterboghe_ for a _reason,_ Wanderer.”

And she’d pulled out the honorific. He resisted sighing out loud.

“They aren’t called _angry_ because they’re _unhappy,_ ” Azadran continued. “They don’t _yell_ at you if you disturb them. They’re tied here because their death was an injustice, or they have a great debt owed to them that is still unpaid, and they don’t have anyone still living to take on the duty of seeing it paid. If someone dies without family or friends or allies or anyone else to press their case, either with the party responsible or with the Jagdsprinz- or even just knowing that the Jagdsprinz and the Hunt are around to discover the debt from the one who still holds it- those are the people in danger of becoming _Haisterboghe_. Their debts are the only thing they think about. The only way to untie them is to get their debt paid, or their injustice seen to. It doesn’t matter who does it, so long as it gets done. But if you come and it’s not to ask what they need doing- _Haisterboghe_ don’t talk. They just attack. You’re sündeyalacgh. You know what a witch-sündeyalacgh could do to someone’s soul.”

János didn’t know _exactly;_ but he could imagine. One of their own going witch, and having to deal with the aftermath of it, wasn’t the sündeyalacgh’s secret nightmare- but that was only because they weren’t sure that it wouldn’t be worse if such a witch left _nothing_ behind for the others to try to fix.

A witch-sündeyalacgh could do what Ereshkigal had done to Nia.

And _that_ was a thought to leave him unbalanced. Of _course_ what had happened to Nia was witchcraft- but thinking _‘witch’_ and _‘Ereshkigal’_ as part of the same concept?

It was chilling even as it was infuriating, and he felt the beginnings of a thought stirring. He sat on them for the moment. Whatever-it-was, it could develop without his conscious attention.

“I think it’s unlikely that Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor would become a _Haisterboghe_ the way we usually think of one,” Azadran admitted. “But with what you said- I think if anything happened, she left something halfway between a powerful _Hajeboghe_ and a _Haisterboghe_. I would look for something like spectral fire, with a very strong feeling of anger attached to it, maybe even with a few sense memories. Something with enough of a scrap of sentience attached to it to act semi-independently; and strong enough that, under the right conditions, a sorcerer or other magic-user could get accidentally pulled into it.”

“They can _do_ that?” János asked, disturbed.

“Usually it takes a Disrägner,” she said. “I don’t know if a sündeyalacgh would be more or less susceptible to it. I’m told it’s like hallucinating, or being under a Tylwyth glamour. You get caught up in the memory and react to what’s happening in _it,_ rather than anything outside of it; or the emotion swamps you and you start acting under its influence. If you realize what’s happening, sometimes you can take yourself out of it, but it’s easier if you have outside help.”

“So don’t go after it myself,” János said.

Now it was Azadranwho looked disturbed.

“There _is_ something?” she asked. “You were just trying to figure out what? You should have said!”

“No,” he said. “No, I haven’t heard anything. I think _you_ would have heard something- Nia died in the middle of a major street in Kharad. If nothing’s happened yet- I just wanted to be prepared, in case, and if it ever comes up again.”

“It wouldn’t hurt to look anyway,” she told him. “Or leave an offering.”

“An offering?”

That sounded suspiciously like religion to him, and Honalee didn’t usually hold to that.

“If a _Haisterboghe_ gets you, it will usually back off if you give it some blood,” Azadran said. “It’s a risk, because they can latch onto your life-force, but it’s not as a big of a danger as it sounds like. _Haisterboghrene_ want people to _hurt,_ because they’re trying to get payment on their debt or avenge them, but they’re too single-minded to really be able to do anything effective about it themselves. One person is a good as another, to them. If you know there’s one around, leaving it things can keep it from grabbing you in the first place. The first thing you do before you go to ask a _Haisterboghe_ what it wants is leave an offering. That lets it know you’re paying attention. So long as a _Haisterboghe_ knows that someone knows what it needs, they’re less likely to hurt someone. Severely scare them, sure. Even hurting someone just a _little._ But not trying to kill.”

“What and where?” János asked.

She looked a little surprised that he was actually asking, and was serious about it.

“Burning twigs like incense sticks is usually the bare minimum,” Azadran told him. “Rowan and pine; and you should write an introduction or well-wishes to the _Hedahe_ on a bark strip or a stone. Lavender and dandelion flowers are good, and apple or cherry blossoms if they’re in season. If you can get jasmine, jasmine. Whole fruit- apples, peaches, oranges. Cinnamon and pepper, gunpowder. The point isn’t to make something big. Like I said, it’s so they know someone’s paying attention, and they calm down a bit. Really, you could offer anything, but there’s something- we’re not sure if it’s a group affinity or if it’s a constant, but the things I listed work the best.”

“The gunpowder and the pepper are good general anti-magic and anti-evil,” János pointed out.

“We know that, so it still might be an affinity,” she said. “Well, it doesn’t matter so much. As for where, there’s a couple of options. If you know who the _Haisterboghe_ is, you can do it at their grave, or their old home, or somewhere that was important to them while they were alive. No one dared leave offerings at the Jagdshall when the demon lived there, so they left them at the Tree and the Well. If you don’t, you go near enough to where the haunting is that you get noticed, but far enough away that you’re not in the- the bother zone.”

 _‘Bother zone’_?

“Hey,” Azadran said, when she saw him quirk a smile. “I didn’t come up with that, my teacher did.”

Somewhere the dead had been well-connected to in life- János could think of a handful of places like that for Nia, but it needed to be something inconspicuous, and none of them really were. They’d be noticed in Berlin and people would talk at the Jagdshall, the manor on Aostarth was _private,_ and the Tree and the Well was on a major road and guarded by Jäger besides.

Wait, though. The Tree and the Well weren’t _personally_ important to the Jagdsprinz. They were a source of power for the Hunt.

If that was a strong enough connection, then János knew a place. Unconventional, but it should work. It might even work _better_ than the other places, given that he was supposed to come with offerings.

“You wouldn’t happen to have some of those offering materials I could borrow, would you?”

Azadran did, and brought him back to her hole-home to hand some over. A thank you, and then he stepped away.

He ended up in a different woods, on one of Martigny’s sheltering mountains, feeling a little strained. He’d never gotten very good at the stepping-travel that Nations could do with the bare minimum of effort.

Nico found him there not very long later. János had gotten the bundle of rowan and pine twigs to smolder, supported on a small pile of mixed cinnamon and dried dandelion petals, and was just finishing up a carefully-written prayer in Irkallan on a rock he’d picked up from around the roots of a tree nearby.

“Not Sankt Michelmarc?” Nico asked, staring up at the statue of the High King that was the focal point for the Honalenier pagan shrine grove. “Did you turn pagan and I just never heard about it?”

“Sankt Michelmarc wouldn’t work for what I’m doing,” János told him, finishing the prayer and putting the rock down on the long offerings altar in front of the statue. “It’s soul stuff. Angry ghosts.”

“Hm,” his cousin replied, looking a little perturbed. “Speaking of- I’m making a visit to Prarayer. Well, eventually. It’s a death visit. _The_ death visit. I’m telling Nia’s family.”

“And you need some support?” he asked, tucking his pencil away in the usual pocket. “I’m done here. And I should talk to England and Irene anyway.”

“Not _support,_ ” Nico said. János thought he needed it anyway, no matter what he said. “But you can explain souls better than I can.”

That was true. And if Nico needed support, well, he wasn’t going to kid himself and try to say that _he_ didn’t. With everything that had happened, if he went to Prarayer by himself, he was probably more likely to grab his parents and cry until his head hurt too much to keep going rather than trying to sort out what needed sorting out.

He was going to have to check on Kharad to make certain that Nia hadn’t left anything behind some other time.

* * *

Reno and Nadri hadn’t returned overnight. Amphitrite was a little disappointed to discover this when she woke the morning after Kharad, but if they weren’t back here at home in Venice, then they were still at the Jagdshall with Sebastian, and taken care of well enough.

They would likely be back by lunch or dinner. She and Feliciano would be done with their work for the day by then, and after dinner they could have a family meeting about how to handle the sudden arrival of the rest of Feliciano’s other family.

It wasn’t quite dawn yet when she slipped out of bed and dressed. She gave her husband a gentle kiss on the face, careful not to wake him, before she left for the Lagoon and Honalee.

By the time she reached the coast of Lintukoto, the sun was halfway up. The sunrise today was brilliantly colorful, yellow and orange light against a lilac-indigo sky and clouds gone ash-black in contrast to the illumination. Amphitrite decided to take it as a good sign.

Sure enough, by the time she arrived at Seppo Ilmarinen’s house, Ahes was awake, seated outside next to the forge, wrapped up in her husband Andvari, their whispers to each other an indistinct, reverent murmur. Ilmarinen was moving around in the open-fronted forge shed as unobtrusively as he could, getting things ready for the day’s work.

“Things are ready?” she asked the smith quietly.

He nodded, and tipped his head towards the pile of thick pillows and outdoor rugs stacked neatly near the entrance of the shed.

She picked up some of the folded rugs and took them into the grass to shake open and spread out to define the sitting area. As she set things out, her son and daughter arrived, Kore bearing a double-basket carrying staff across her shoulders.

Arion wasn’t giving his sister a ride, as he usually did. He was limping.

“What happened?” Amphitrite asked, checking her son over carefully. He leaned into her and blew out a quiet snort.

“He was upset about the Jagdsprinz,” Kore told her. “And went to Irkalla to express his displeasure. Mayet drove the butt of her staff in here-”

She very gently touched a spot in the middle of the thick knot of muscles on his chest that moved one of his front legs.

“-to tell him that visitors are not currently welcome.”

 Feliciano had been a bit of a bad influence on her. Venexian insults snarled themselves in her head as she had Arion lie down in the grass and told her daughter to fetch water from the forge-pump so she could wet her hands and soothe the bruising Mayet had caused.

Kaschei Perun came as she checked over the muscles, and took up rugs and pillows without being asked to help Kore finish setting up the sitting area. Kore’s baskets were placed out in the middle of the rugs and opened to reveal bread, watered sweet wine, and fresh snacking vegetables.

Xī Wángmŭ had brought peaches and candied apples, and fine porcelain jugs of pure spring snowmelt. Möngkedai Khan didn’t bring anything but his horse to pasture nearby, but Rāvaṇa turned up with a scribe’s traveling lap desk, with the firmly-secured sheaf of paper and ink pot, and took out his pen. He ran a soft cloth over its steel nib, checked the angle of his hand and arm, and swiftly took down the names of everyone present in the proper sharp, flowing lines of mastered Kuberan calligraphy as the others Kings assembled themselves on the pillows.

“We are not yet all assembled,” Amphitrite told him.

Rāvaṇa raised an eyebrow at her.

“Oh?”

“Did you invite Hawaiki?” Kaschei asked. “If you did, we may as well start now. They never come for anything. The last time I saw anyone from Hawaiki, they were coming to acknowledge Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor and give their consent for the Tripartite Treaty.”

“I thought Mother wasn’t talking to anyone,” Ahes said.

“Chicomoztoc has refused their King,” Wángmŭ said. “But- were you able to find Nicnevin?”

“No,” Amphitrite told them, and waited.

Presently, a griffin approached through the wild grass, tail swishing behind them, accompanied by a man in a red shirt and pants under a wide gold-edged blue wrap.

A number of the other Kings shot her looks.

“If Ereshkigal is denounced by the Jagdsprinz and her appointments mean nothing,” Amphitrite told them. “And such as our host and my children, who rule over no people, only land, merit a place at Congress as those of us with both, then the Domdruc and the Turājada Dhineijan are just as entitled.”

Kaschei Perun grumbled and glared a bit, and Xī Wángmŭ kept a coolly distant look. Ahes and Rāvaṇa were the only ones with a smile for the griffin and the human man.

“Your names?” Rāvaṇa asked politely.

“Hrauketrieg,” the griffin told him, and lay down on the edge of the rugs next to Ahes and Andvari. “ _Keda_ of the Irvinrdisganheid.”

“Lord Hiruz was unavailable?” Andvari asked.

Hrauketrieg clacked their beak at him.

“Hiruz may speak for the Jagdsprinz and the Hunt,” they said chillily. “And he may be a member of the Irvinrdisganheid. But _I_ am _Keda. I_ am the one in charge.”

“Ahbajit av Maduvati,” the man with them told Rāvaṇa, as he sat near him. “High Priest of the Turājada Dhineijan.”

“ _Now_ we are all here,” Amphitrite told the group, glancing around with a look that _dared_ anyone to challenge further.

No one did, so she inclined her head at the griffin.

“I believe the place to begin this Congress is with your people, _Keda_ Hrauketrieg,” she said. “As the Hunt resides in your lands.”

The _Keda_ blinked a few times, and tilted their head back and forth, before going stock-still in the manner of a traveling singer about to tell a history.

“The Irvinrkallrene met the evening last,” they told the group. “In Nysa, so all could see and hear. We had heard of Chicomoztoc and the Silent Hills, and we have decided that we shall give Ereshkigal’s appointment of Kings no more weight than we ever have. The only difference is now that _others_ may see and agree that _‘King of the Jägerskov’_ is an empty title.”

“The Jagdsprinz-” Xī Wángmŭ started to protest, but Hrauketrieg snapped their beak at her to keep her quiet.

“If this had happened with Jagdsprinz Erlkönig and his Hunt, yes, it would be like that,” the griffin said. “But Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor was a _republican._ So long as her Hunt continues to respect her established treatment of our body, they are welcome to stay- barring any questions of legitimacy that may arise.”

Amphitrite went cold all down her spine- _‘questions of legitimacy’_?

Rāvaṇa had stopped writing.

“ _‘Was’_?” he asked shrewdly.

 _Keda_ Hrauketrieg fixed the group with one eye.

“The Irvinrkallrene is a government as any other,” they said. “As is Hunt High Command. The Marschalls are Jäger, and will not lie while serving in the Jagdsprinz’s place- but Lord Hiruz told it to us, before we went before the Domdruc and those others in Nysa. Sorcerer Héderváry is convinced Teufelmördor is dead. None can refute him, but none wish to announce such news while so much else is at stake.”

“The Tylwyth have always been arrayed against themselves,” Andvari said. “A Jagdsprinz or not will make no difference to them now that they have started.”

Möngkedai Khan met Amphitrite’s eyes for a moment across the circle.

“It’s not the Tylwyth they’re worried about,” he told the other King. “It’s the Pict.”

“The Tripartite Treaty’s hold is unbreakable only so long as there is a Jagdsprinz and a Hunt to enforce it,” Amphitrite said. “And to act as sword and shield against the threat of Pict invasion. There is no Jagdsprinz now, and the Speaker of the Pict is _upset._ ”

“The demon had nothing to do with her,” Kaschei said.

“She was caught up by it,” Möngkedai told him. “They don’t work like us. They’re what the humans call a _‘hive-mind’_. They may have individual bodies, but they act as one being. The Speaker is a concentrate of that… you can’t even call it a consciousness until she holds it, because it’s spread too thin.”

“The Jäger on a Hunt,” Hrauketrieg put in. “As opposed to Teufelmördor with the Jagdsprinz, facing Ereshkigal.”

That was a good opening, and Amphitrite glanced over at her daughter to make sure she didn’t miss it.

“I’ve been watching Irkalla,” Kore said, picking up on the hint. “It is- I don’t like being so close to it now. _I_ haven’t tried to approach it, but my brother has. Mayet assaulted him for his trouble. We aren’t welcome there, and Ereshkigal isn’t coming out.”

“Nothing new there,” Rāvaṇa muttered as he transcribed her words.

Amphitrite, Wángmŭ, and Andvari caught each other’s glances. They three were the only ones present who had ever had a personal relationship with the Queen of Irkalla, and even then it had been distant. After they had been taught to read and write, and been grounded to Ereshkigal’s satisfaction in magic, they’d never been invited back. The gates of Irkalla had stayed closed, with perpetual watch kept by Mayet at the first door and Ammut in the swamp- two guards none of them could recall the first appearance of.

They had simply _been,_ one day, and none of them was certain whether they had been before or not.

“The Jagdsprinz is gone and Ereshkigal won’t come,” Ahes said, sounding surprisingly decisive about the situation for someone who’d had less than a full day to catch up on multiple centuries of history and cultural change. “So it has to be my mother and my younger siblings. I will go to speak to them once I have finished my business here.”

Möngkedai scowled at her a little.

“I understand that this is an important occasion for your husband,” he said. “But there are _gerekh_ and Thálassians and most of the Turājada Dhineijan out in Earth-side space where the Pict can get them-”

“You mistake my meaning,” Ahes cut him off coldly. “Certainly, my husband and I are happy to be reunited, but that would not keep me from safeguarding the cousins my own people left behind to come to me. I have _gone_ to Kêr-Is, Möngkedai Khan, and I have promised the angry ghosts of my people the payment of their debts. I _will_ conclude further pacification rituals before I leave to see my mother.”

That shut the Congress up completely. Even Rāvaṇa stopped writing in the middle of a word to stare at her.

“Was that,” Seppo Ilmarinen said carefully. “Perhaps. Not the _best_ idea, or timing?”

“And when better time would that be?” she demanded. “Wait idly by with my husband as it is argued out how to send me and the others home without destroying the universe, and do _nothing_ until we are all dead of old age? Or, through some miracle, a solution that does not involve yet more witchcraft is found and executed, and then _I_ hold it up because my people are not attended to? I have promised first, and now everyone _knows_ that this must be fulfilled _before_ I can be sent back to my own time to be _murdered_ by one of my dearest friends!”

“You must look out for your people first,” Ahbajit said quietly, surprisingly everyone by finally talking. “I understand. The Turājada Dhineijan learned that lesson hard, and often. We have not forgotten what is owed between leader and led.”

Kaschei Perun bristled at that, his beard bushing out with static, and Amphitrite took a slightly deeper breath than normal and told herself that Ahbajit could handle this himself- that he _had_ to handle this himself. Kings could step in for other Kings because they had established that authority between themselves already. The Turājada Dhineijan had to fight for this from the others, just as they’d always had to fight to be given _anything_ by Honalee.

At least the Domdruc had the margins of respect that came from being native, not human, to serve as foundation for everything else they claimed.

“And what would _you_ know about that?” Kaschei demanded of the High Priest.

“What would _you_ know of it?” Ahbajit asked. Others besides her definitely noticed the way his hands tightened in his lap, but there were some things you just didn’t call attention to unless you _really_ wanted to change the tone of the conversation. “Buyan has never suffered the indignity of having the lives of its people beholden to one who cares _nothing_ for them. The Turājada Dhineijan learned how _not_ to lead, learned what we were _owed,_ by watching those who enslaved us.”

One of those peoples, being, of course, the Buyanov. It was a neat little insult about the King’s judgement and ability to govern well, good enough for any Court conversationalist.

Kaschei went quite red, and Hrauketrieg stepped in.

“The Buyanov have never been slaughtered or conquered or _imposed_ upon by a foreign power,” they told him. “Any authority is best judged by how well they protect those in their care while under duress. The Queen of Kêr-Is has acted exactly as she should. If Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor had been here to call this Congress, she would say the same.”

Hrauketrieg looked over at Ahes.

“And she would have gone with you,” they told her. “If she had known what you were going to do. She would have promised those ghosts revenge herself, and gone right away to Irkalla to force Ereshkigal to make good on her debts.”

“What purpose does this serve?” Xī Wángmŭ asked, affecting boredom in an attempt to diffuse the situation before the arguing could get more serious. “I would like to return to the topic.”

“We _have_ a topic?” Andvari asked.

“Of course we do,” Amphitrite informed them. “I thought it was obvious. We are informing each other what our stance on the current situation is.”

“That wasn’t obvious at all, mother,” she heard Kore mutter.

“It was obvious to _me,_ ” Hrauketrieg said, and sounded a little smug about it. “ _I_ told you all what the Domdruc think, or did you all miss that?”

“The Turājada Dhineijan agree with the Irvinrkallrene,” Ahbajit said. “Ereshkigal has no true authority outside her own walls. Anything she decrees, we consider invalid, unless individual Kingdoms agree to it voluntarily. There, we shall honor the decrees as law.”

“And how are we to accept _that?_ ” Xī Wángmŭ demanded acerbically. “The Jagdsprinz’s Pact is not something that can simply be _discarded!_ ”

The High Priest looked confused.

“When did I say anything about doing that?”

“Just now!” she exclaimed. Most of the rest of the group nodded, or made quiet noises of agreement. “Not holding to the laws Ereshkigal gives, unless the Kings agree? If a King _does not-_ ”

“The Jagdsprinz’s Pact is _not_ Ereshkigal’s law,” Ahbajit said firmly. “The Jagdsprinz upholds it. Not her.”

He looked at each King in turn.

“And which of you,” he asked. “Would discard the Jagdsprinz’s Pact?”

None of them, Amphitrite knew. She folded her hands neatly in her lap and gave herself the next turn.

“Póli Thálassas denounces Ereshkigal,” she said. “She has been named traitor and liar and deceiver by the Jagdsprinz itself, and we will not stand against the Hunt.”

Some of the others were eyeing her uncomfortably. That last part had just skirted the edge of a promise- which should make what she had to say next quite the bombshell.

“I myself,” Amphitrite announced, choosing her words carefully. “Stand against Ereshkigal on the behalf of Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor, and my husband, and their family.”

Kaschei Perun looked like someone had just stuffed a lemon in his mouth, and just about everyone else looked like they wanted to get out of the way before whatever was coming for her, came.

Except Möngkedai Khan. He smiled wide enough that it turned into a bearing of teeth, savage good humor glinting in his eyes.

“The Seven _Tsergiin_ of Vörös Saikhan Tal _re_ nounce Ereshkigal, so-called Queen of Irkalla,” he said. “I, Ulandai, son of Sechen Qara Ganagni altangerelsalki gerekh naraani, who was Trade-Lord in Ordon Khot before the coming of the Kings, declare the title of Möngkedai Khan _void,_ and the _tsergiin_ chiefs of Altangerelsalki, of Nomrynsaaralüüls, of Shuurga-ayanga, of Büjgiinkhooroduuls, of Khavarövsmanaach, of Shonkhorüzekh, and of Dalain-tenger to be Lords once more. I will call a meeting in Ordon Khot to deliver the news- and I will exhort the _tsergiin_ to stand with Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor and her Hunt, as I shall.”

“Lanka Kubera denounces Ereshkigal,” Rāvaṇa said, not looking up from his paper. His less-than-outright declaration of sides- she wasn’t going to say she wasn’t disappointed, but Amphitrite understood. Her, Ulandai, the Irvinrkallrene, and the Turājada Dhineijan were the ones who would _really_ lose if Ereshkigal got her way- she and Ulandai the large numbers of their people who lived on other planets, and the Irvinrkallrene and the Turājada Dhineijan their protection and independence.

The other Kings didn’t have as much of a pressing reason to change how they’d always run.

Except that the Jagdsprinz had declared Ereshkigal unworthy of her name. For people who had been _so_ worried about the Jagdsprinz’s Pact, they were being very non-committal. She rather wanted to point that out to them.

No. It was too good a bargaining tool. The other Kings were already declaring against Ereshkigal, but she might need something to strong-arm them with later.

Just in case they had ideas about staying _neutral_ in all this.

* * *

When Nico and János turned up at the Vatican, quiet and somber, Cristoforo hadn’t actually guessed what they’d come about. He’d thought it was simply trying to deal with being able to see lost family, yet having that family not be exactly the same people they’d lost- _he_ was hurting, even as he kept a grip on the situation, but these two were much more in the thick of it.

He hadn’t at all been expecting them to say that Nia was dead- or gone, like Ludwig.

Nico’s reasoning was sound, at least. Cristoforo had plenty of experience telling others people they loved were dead.

He called Gilbert first.

“Hey,” the other man said as soon as he picked up. “Kit, about that kissing-”

“Oh, we _will_ be talking about that,” Cristoforo informed him. “But that is not why I am calling. Gilbert- Nico and János have come to see me. They just told me that we have lost Nia.”

For a few moments, he was left listening to controlled, even breathing.

“ _‘Lost’_?” Gilbert said. “Not dead.”

“It is something like Ludwig,” Cristoforo told him. “I am going to give you to János. He knows the _‘how’-_ ”

“No,” Gilbert cut him off. “No- Kit. I don’t want to know.”

“Gilbert-”

“I know what happened to Ludwig and _I don’t want to know!_ ”

“Ah,” Cristoforo said quietly. “I am sorry. I need to speak to Ludwig and Feliciano- but is there anything you need from me? Anything you want?”

“No. I just- no. Not now.”

“Call me if it changes,” Cristoforo told him firmly. “Helike is a long trip, but my state is small. They will be fine without me, when my family will not be.”

“Course I will, Kit,” Gilbert said quietly. “Thanks.”

“As always, _carissime_.”

He ended the call and stared off into the distance.

“ _Zio_ Cris?”

“I am thinking, Nicodemo.”

“We have Prarayer or Venice-”

“I am trying to decide who might need me for longer.”

Certainly there were more people at Prarayer- Ludwig, his children, Lovino and Antonio, Giovanna- who had been family to Nia, and already emotionally vulnerable from the sudden trauma of the day before. But Ludwig would likely not want to talk about his feelings, Lovino and Antonio had each other, Giovanna had never been as close to Nia as the others had been, and Heinrich and Zell- well, he wasn’t sure about them.

Feliciano would want to cry in company, and Cristoforo wasn’t sure how much use Amphitrite or their children would be for that.

It would have to be Feliciano first, then.

“Venice,” Cristoforo told Nico, and held his hand out for him to take. It felt a bit _wrong,_ to have to rely on Nico and János’s magic to step them from the Vatican to Feliciano’s office, but he could live with it.

His brother didn’t have any visitors at the moment, thankfully. It seemed that he was in the one quiet part of the morning, when the rest of the Second Republic’s officials were off seeing to their own portions of what needed to be done.

“Do you want to have Amphitrite here?” Cristoforo asked him. “Or your children?”

“Amphitrite went to talk to people in Honalee this morning,” Feliciano said. “And Reno and Nadri are still in Martigny- Nico, when are they coming back?”

There was one beat too long of silence, and Cristoforo looked over at his nephew to find that he’d frozen up.

“Nico?” Feliciano asked, worrying tinging his voice. “They’re… okay, right?”

“I assumed they’d told you,” Nico said. “I don’t know why they didn’t tell you.”

_“Nico.”_

Nico visibly set his shoulders, and fixed his gaze just over Feliciano’s shoulder, at the wall behind him. Cristoforo didn’t like that look- that was the look of someone delivering news they didn’t want to bear.

“ _Razanás_ Venexia,” he said. “Yesterday afternoon, Tirenno came to High Command and turned himself in for witchcraft, complicit in the actions of Béutros Saab, the demon Belial, and the deaths and damage caused by both. Nadri came after him, and even though she was _warned_ not to and given the opportunity to renounce her words _,_ told us that if we tried to execute him, she would, I quote- _“kill you first, I don’t care if you’re Jäger, he doesn’t deserve that”_. We arrested them both, pending further review of Tirenno’s confession by the Department of Legal Affairs and magical experts-”

“You and Mosè,” Feliciano cut him off, and Cristoforo heard the hint of bite in the words.

“Yes.”

“He’s your-”

“Family isn’t supposed to matter,” Nico said, eyes sliding from the wall to the floor as he hunched up a little and shifted uncomfortably. “Rule of law is. Justice. Fairness. Nia wouldn’t want us to-”

Feliciano shot out of his seat.

“You go back there _right now!_ ” he half-yelled at Nico, pointing out one of the office windows northwest, towards Martigny. “And you _tell Nia-_ ”

Cristoforo reached for his brother.

“Feliciano,” he said. “Felicianus. _Fratellone_.”

Feliciano jerked in surprise at hearing Italian- much less Cristoforo calling him _‘big brother’_ \- and looked over at him.

“Feliciano- Nia is gone.”

His brother looked at him blankly.

“Where’d she go?” he asked, and then Cristoforo saw the dawning denial.

“Feliciano-”

_“No.”_

“This was terrible timing,” Cristoforo told him, glancing over at Nico. “And I am sorry. I did not know about Tirreno and Nadri. But Nia- Ereshkigal-”

János picked up the cue, thankfully.

“She ripped apart Nia’s soul-essence when she banished the Jagdsprinz,” he said. “And she knew what she was doing. It’s like with Germany and Mephistopheles, except with what made her… _exist,_ be alive, _have_ a soul at all. Not memories. When Maria disappeared from Kharad- by the time she turned up wherever she went, Nia’s soul would have completely fallen apart.”  

“She’s not coming back, _Zio_ Feli,” Nico said reluctantly. “We’re trying to keep it quiet for now. I’m sorry.”

Cristoforo’s eyes didn’t leave his brother when he quietly told Nico and János to leave the room. They left, and he opened his arms, and Feliciano gave him a heartbroken lookof mixed grief and dismay and anger and collapsed into him.

He held him tightly as Feliciano clutched his cassock and drew noisy, sharp breaths with rough edges of tears.

“I can’t keep a _family!_ ” he said bitterly. “I am _that_ bad a person, Cristoforo? Have I done so much wrong that everyone has to _die?_ I _lost_ Ludwig and Nia, Heinrich and Zell and Lovino died, and now _Reno_ and _Nadri_ -!”

Cristoforo made quiet, nonsense soothing sounds, and hoped that Feliciano would be able to get through this better than he had losing Ludwig.

* * *

God-fucking-damn-it-all, but it _hurt._

He hadn’t been expecting the sheer _rage_ that swiftly rose after he’d gotten off the line with Cristoforo. Gilbert knew himself well enough to keep still and breathe through it, to let himself be mindlessly furious but not take it out on anything for a few moments while the emotions underpinning the reaction turned up.

He didn’t even really _like_ Nia any longer.

But- sometimes he remembered that he’d loved her, and realized that he’d still loved her, even after everything. Sometimes an intelligence report or political briefing would get delivered, or he’d see her at a state function, or get news of her from the other Nations, or they’d have a meeting about law enforcement and she’d saysomething-

And Gilbert would get a little twinge of pride, and think a fleeting _yeah, there she goes_ colored with the same sort of bloody-minded satisfaction that he got when he landed a really good hit or pointed comment.

And sometimes he felt like that when she’d gotten _him_ good, and that had always pissed him off a little.

He hadn’t been expecting to hurt this much about it, and he didn’t like that.

She shouldn’t have even _been_ in danger, at that point. The demon had been killed. Nia had been doing her _job,_ the duty she had lived for and held to so tightly and with all the integrity she’d been able to muster.

It had been a lot, and Ereshkigal hadn’t cared a bit. She- she was like _Cassiel._ She only cared about protecting herself. Nobody else mattered. Nobody else was really a _person._ He’d heard just as well as everyone else the games she’d been playing with the Honalenier, through their Kings; and the way she’d just _ignored_ the Nations even when she’d been partially responsible for them _existing_ in the first place. She’d let him and all the others get treated like shit for centuries, and then had the gall to _murder_ one of the first people to stand up for them.

Gilbert could still remember the day Nia had walked into a UN meeting like she owned the room and accused the present government leaders of human rights violations where it came to their Nations, then shouted them all down in a voice that would have made Ludwig proud. He’d been full of warm fuzzy feelings for _hours_ after Miervaldis had copied that bit of security footage and e-mailed it to everyone.

 _Fuck_ Ereshkigal. She’d let Ludwig get destroyed, and then she tore Nia apart _herself._ Sure, he was angry about the way everything _else_ was falling apart now that there wasn’t a Jagdsprinz and a Hunt- but Nia was _his._

Worse, almost, was that he knew- he _knew-_ that Nia had been the same way. She’d detested him and he’d hated being around her and her grudges; but he’d helped raise her and maybe she was shit at letting things go and Ivan should have pounded her until she got it into her head that you just couldn’t _do that_ when you had to live with the same people for centuries on end-

But they’d managed to work together. As long as it had been professional, ever since the Human Imperial State started, they’d been able to make it work. They’d been productive and functional and cooperate and- well, shit, it was like how he and Erzsébet had been back when he’d actually had his own people. They’d fight each other viciously and without remorse, but as soon as they were on the same side, they’d always trusted each other _completely._ Not without little pokes at each other, to get a rise, but that was just them. In the field-

He and Nia had never been a physical fight on the same side, but Gilbert almost wished they had been. It would’ve been _glorious._ The sort of fight he _loved,_ where it was just blood and violence and power and then when it was over, it was _over,_ and everyone knew who’d won and you could walk away smiling like a maniac on that high.

Or maybe- they should have let themselves have that fight with each _other,_ appearances and propriety be damned. Ludwig had always hated it, but Gilbert was older and had seen more and knew that sometimes, a Nation just had to step up and punch another one out and have a nice brawl so everyone could feel like they’d proved they hadn’t given in by apologizing- even though no one had actually _apologized,_ during or after, but everyone _understood_ that was what the fight had been about.

Yeah, Ludwig had liked using words, and tried to make everyone else use them to, and Gilbert didn’t blame him. His brother’s wars hadn’t been clean fights- not that any fight between countries ever had been, but between Nations, personally, things were usually different, or they were _supposed_ to be. The World Wars had seriously twisted the usual wartime dynamic between Nations around, and a good part of that was on him and Ludwig, because Ludwig hadn’t followed any of the rules, but _he_ hadn’t taught his brother right, so.

But it meant that Ludwig didn’t get that, when the thought of words stung at your pride too much, a little brawling could work just as well. He’d never been able to see that letting people keep their pride _and_ get some satisfaction for their grievances was the better way to go, because he’d never kept his pride. What other people hadn’t stomped on, he’d torn out himself trying to make up for things.

Nia hadn’t been living with Ludwig, though, she’d been living with Ivan. Ivan was old- _he_ understood. It was too late now, but Gilbert saw that he should have gone to him a long time ago and had a time and somewhere private arranged for him and Nia to go at it.

They’d both been trying too hard to live up to Ludwig’s standards, and the morality of the times.

He was an old Nation and Nia had been a King of Honalee. They were different than all that, and he should have followed that thought far enough to come to this conclusion before now. Yeah, it was Nia’s fault they’d still been feuding and he wasn’t going to be sorry for lying because it hadn’t been _wrong,_ but she was still his niece and he was supposed to look out for her.

Kind of. Stuff got complicated when young Nations ran off and got themselves independent and you had to work with them like equals, but that didn’t mean you lost _all_ your responsibilities to them.

And now Nia wasn’t around any longer.

* * *

_Vati_ hadn’t in the wing of rooms they’d been given in this palace when Heinrich woke up, too early, and he’d been left to linger restlessly in the wing’s common area. Zell had joined him, after not too long, looking tired.

“Didn’t sleep well?” he’d asked her. His had been okay, except for waking up much too early.

“It was all broken up into chunks,” his sister told him. “I just decided to give up.”

He’d nodded vaguely, and kept pacing as Zell sat quietly in one of the cushioned chairs and looked around at everything, staring at details.

“I don’t understand how this happened,” she said abruptly, now. “How did- an entire new monarchy? Just like that? The book didn’t say anything about that. All Nia had was- those people. And an impending border dispute with Switzerland. Switzerland’s been a republic longer than just about anyone.”

Heinrich had to agree with her. Palaces were big and he understood that if you needed to house a lot of people suddenly somewhere where you could easily keep an eye on them, a palace was a good place to do that. Keeping a large group of people where you could keep an eye on them easily was practically the entire _point_ of a palace.

But a palace meant monarchy. A kingdom. Nico had said _empire._

Nia had an empire. Empire meant _war,_ and conquering, and-

He didn’t want to think that Nia was like that.

But she had an empire.

The two of them were alone with their thoughts for too long before their _Vati_ turned up, silent and looking crushed, with _Tio_ Antonio, whose smile and usual cheer didn’t ring quite true.

 _Tio_ Antonio had gotten breakfast together, and for a couple minutes it was just the three of them in the room with the food.

Heinrich grabbed his _Vati,_ and clung to him tightly.

 _Vati_ moved to hug him back too slowly.

“You weren’t here when I woke up,” Heinrich said into his father’s shirt, trusting that he could draw the connection, figure out the unspoken fear.

They weren’t supposed to outlive their parents.

“I’m sorry,” _Vati_ told him quietly. He sounded numb, and Heinrich fiercely wished that _Vati_ was still Germany, right now, because then he could have _done_ something about that, maybe. He’d be able to send something _nice,_ something like love, or _‘I’m hurting too’_ , through the citizen bond, and then _Vati_ would really _know._

He hadn’t realized until now just how much he was used to communicating with his parents about emotions like that. He couldn’t clearly remember a time when he _hadn’t_ had that to use to supplement- or even replace- his words.

Breakfast was subdued. Part of it was almost definitely because this was a strange place in unfavorable circumstances, but the other Nations kept glancing over at _Vati,_ or _Zio_ Vino, and then a new layer of gloom would settle.

Everyone was finished, and were hanging about listlessly or awkwardly, as their current mental state dictated, when _Zio_ Cris, Nico, and János arrived.

Gianna, unsurprisingly, went straight for her father. János’s parents went to him, and _Zio_ Vino grabbed Nico’s arm and _stared_ at him, like he thought he’d disappear if he didn’t.

 _Tio_ Antonio hung back, and that was strange. Also strange was the way Nico was looking at him and Zell and _Vati,_ but trying not to.

“What?” Heinrich asked after a couple of seconds of this, sharply enough that other people looked over.

“There’s some stuff we have to tell you,” Nico said. “But- about yesterday, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have left you alone with that.”

Heinrich felt a muscle in his neck twitch from biting back a _‘good, you **should** be’_.

“It was informative,” he said instead.

 _Zio_ Cris gently disentangled himself from Gianna, and bundled her and him and Zell and Rémy and _Vati,_ and _Zio_ Vino and _Tio_ Antonio, into another room.

Heinrich had thought it was going to be a talk about _Babbo,_ though he had no idea why János would be here for that, but-

“I do not know how much you understood of yesterday,” _Zio_ Cris said, tone suspiciously gentle. He’d gotten everyone into the room, but now he was mostly looking at _Vati._ “But I know what you saw. I know that the last day has been very bad for sudden, unfortunate news, but-”

If they were here to tell them that they couldn’t get them home-

“We are presuming Lavinia dead.”

 _Vati_ looked at him blankly.

“What’s _that_ supposed to mean?” Zell asked. “You don’t _know?_ ”

“No,” János said. “We just can’t prove it.”

“You _can’t-_ ”

“We haven’t got a body, Zell,” Nico cut in. “But János is here to explain why it’s… really, really unlikely that she’s alive.”

János looked over to a corner of the room and said: “Jacques, could I have a diorama?”

A thinly-outlined, sideless box appeared in thin air in front of him, a little lower than chest height.

Most of the room, himself included, looked over at the corner in alarm.

“There’s not anybody _there,_ ” Nico explained as János muttered to himself and poked things, filling in some sort of three-dimensional diagram. “Not _there-_ there. Jacques is Martinach’s AI.”

_AIs!_

“You got them to work?” Heinrich asked, trying to distract himself. This was- _Nia._ “How’d you figure it out?”

“You can’t just do it with computers,” Nico told him. “AIs are people, they have to have a soul. It doesn’t just sort of happen, like with babies forming. You have to make the magic do it on purpose. János is the only one who can do it; or at least he’s the only one who’s figured it out. He’s not telling.”

There were- there was _so much_ in that set of statements, he didn’t even know where to _start._

If János had actually heard the explanation, he was ignoring that it had happened. He was still muttering to himself- or not himself? Apparently you couldn’t see AIs- and didn’t react to the way Gianna was giving him a look of such scandalized, almost outraged consternation.

Heinrich kind of wanted to, as well. His cousin- _souls,_ made to order?

She looked like she was going to say something, but _Zio_ Cris shook his head a little at her, and she didn’t.

“All right,” János said, to get everyone’s attention. “So, I have to explain basics first. There are five parts to a soul. The body-”

The box in front of him now held an indistinct human figure, attached to a sort of lumpy blob by a short string. The human figure lit up briefly.

“-the life-force-”

The string.

“-the shadow-soul-”

One of the lumps.

“-the mind-”

The other lump.

“-and the soul-essence.”

That was the rest of the blob.

“When someone just dies regularly, that’s the life-force unraveling,” he said, and touched the string on the model. It split apart like a steel cable fraying all at once. “That’s the only part of the soul that’s meant to come apart.”

The string replaced itself, and János glanced, a little nervously, over at _Vati._

“What happened with, uh,” he tried to start, stumbling over the words. “With Mephistopheles and… everything. That you read about. No one really _died._ ”

Heinrich remembered that, in the book, people had been very insistent about that.

“The memories just got taken out,” János said, and pinched the _‘mind’_ lump. A bit came off, and he lifted it away. “Others filled in later, and so you got a new person, but the same soul, really. Fundamentally, anyway- memories don’t make a person, but they build what they are. It’s witchcraft to take them away. That’s why it’s different than amnesia. Amnesia, its brain damage- you’re physically blocked from accessing the memories, or where it’s been linked into the body, in your brain, has been destroyed. But it doesn’t do anything to your soul.”

He unpinched his fingers.

“What Ereshkigal did to Nia was different again,” he continued. “Nia got something extra when she got made Jagdsprinz.”

A shadowy part appeared on the diagram, mostly separate from the blob attached to the body, but with parts woven into the blob.

“That’s the Jagdsprinz,” János said. “Ereshkigal banished it outside the universe. It did something like-”

He grabbed the shadowy bit and tore. The weave ripped out and the blob started to go up in smoke. The lumps of _‘mind’_ and _‘shadow-soul’_ started to fall as their support disappeared, and vanished. The string frayed from the opposite end, flying apart and dissolving.

János let go of the shadow, and it disappeared too. There was only the body left.

“Maria ran off with the body,” János said. “And we don’t know where she went. So we don’t have it. But that’s not really… survivable.”

Heinrich had gone cold in his chest, right beneath his heart. János dropped his hands, and the display faded out.

“I-” Zell started to say, then bolted from the room. Rémy followed right on her heels, rushing to catch up to his wife. _Tio_ Antonio murmured something indistinct, probably about making sure they were going to be okay, and pulled _Zio_ Vino out of the room after them.

Heinrich looked over at _Vati,_ wanting to help, but- he looked, and no. That was too much.

He looked at János instead.

“So there’s not- really anything left of her?” he said.

“Yeah,” János told him, not managing to meet his eyes. “Basically.”

“Okay,” Heinrich said. No _soul,_ no real death- not right now. “How do we- handle funeral arrangements?”

“There aren’t any yet,” Nico said. “The galaxy has enough troubles right now with just the Hunt not functioning _without_ everyone knowing Nia’s dead, too. We’re keeping it quiet for now.”

“Oh,” he said. “Okay.”

Well. They’d tell him when they decided to change that. In the meantime, he’d… figure something out.

“I’m going to go-”

He couldn’t think of anywhere.

“I’m going to go,” Heinrich repeated, and left.

* * *

Lovino and Antonio and Rémy were going to handle Zell. Heinrich needed someone as well, but he could keep for a bit more. He had some idea how Feliciano’s children would react to grief- it wouldn’t be the same as before, of course, the circumstances were all different- but he had no idea how Ludwig would handle grief.

If he handled it at all. He’d never been known as a particularly emotionally competent person.

Quietly, he asked Gianna and Nico and János to give them the room, and then turned his full attention to his brother-in-law.

“Is there anything you need?” Cristoforo asked him. “Anything you want?”

“My _family,_ ” he said, so obviously without thinking. He shut up as soon as the words left him, and looked determined not to say anything else.

Cristoforo resisted the urge to sigh in sadness. That was always the answer with Feliciano’s side of the family- so why couldn’t they all just stop a moment and _see_ that they all wanted the same thing, and stop fighting and not talking to each other?

“I can ask Feliciano and Gilbert to come,” he said.

Immediately, Ludwig’s expression convulsed into something of such mixed emotion that it was completely unreadable.

“Do you not want to see them?”

It would be… understandable. Regretful, and it would hurt Feliciano and Gilbert to hear, but understandable.

“I don’t know what I want,” Ludwig said, hands tightening into fists. “I don’t know what to think. I don’t even know what I’m feeling. There’s nothing.”

“You do not have to know,” Cristoforo assured him. “This is a complex situation, and emotions are rarely easy, when they are in response to such things.”

“I don’t understand how… any of this.”

“It is a series of quite long stories,” Cristoforo said. “And I am not sure that hearing them now would help the situation.”

* * *

She’d known it couldn’t have been a good thing that Cristoforo had pulled the entire Beilschmidt-Costa family away to have a private talk, but Erzsébet didn’t start to get actively worried about it until Zell burst out of the meeting and fled to her assigned room, and then Rémy right after her, and Lovino and Antonio after _them._

Antonio dismissed Francis’s questions about what was wrong with a _“later”_ as they hurried through, and Heinrich just didn’t seem to be registering anything going on around him as he wandered away; but thankfully Gianna, Nico, and János came out of the room looking focused and coherent.

“What’s _wrong?_ ” Francis asked them.

“Nia’s dead,” Nico answered after a second.

Somehow, that was still a shock. Erzsébet was going to blame it on the book, and the way everyone seemed so _certain_ that _Seelenkind_ were functionally immortal-

But England’s granddaughter had been killed, and so had Cassiel. They were more vulnerable than people thought, apparently.

And now she was worried about her son. He was a sündeyalacgh, and by his own admission he’d spent his life wandering Honalee and the galaxy- what sort of life-threatening trouble had _he_ gotten himself into? How many times had he gotten too close to death?

“You said there wasn’t a- a body,” Gianna said, looking to Nico and János. “But when do we get Cassiel?”

Nico blinked at her.

“What?”

“My _brother,_ ” she said sharply. “When do we get him, for the funeral?”

“You’re-” Nico started to say, and stopped himself. He stayed silent for a moment, obviously collecting himself.

“You might want to ask,” he said carefully. “If there’s going to be one.”

“I,” she said, tone become agitated. “I _saw_ his body!”

“Not that. A funeral.”

“Of _course_ he’s getting a funeral!”

“Gianna,” Nico said, sounding reluctant about it. “He died a witch and a murderer.”

“He’s my _brother!_ ” she told him angrily.

“And he was also a pretty… _bad_ person-”

“He was still a _person-_ ”

“ _Witches_ don’t count!” János cut her off, and Erzsébet _knew_ the grief he had to hold over losing his family like that was still fresh, but there was no call for that. “You are the _only_ person who ever held out hope for him, Giovanna, and he never did anything to deserve it!”

She was going over there _right now._

Giovanna stared at him in utter shock for a moment, and then outrage flashed across her face.

“He was _my brother!_ ” she snapped at him, raising her voice. “And I am _not_ the only person, _Pater_ and-”

“You _died_ still thinking he deserved more chances,” János cut her off again. “All three of your parents had accepted he was irredeemable _decades_ before that!”

“ _Pater_ would _never,_ ” Gianna insisted. “ _No one_ is irredeemable-”

“Exodus, Leviticus!” János shot back. “Witches _deserve_ to be killed-”

_“Cassiel didn’t!”_

“Jansci,” Erzsébet said, putting a hand on her son’s shoulder. “I know you’ve lost-”

János shoved her away without even looking at her, focused on Gianna with an expression of rage and bitterness. Erzsébet was so stunned that her son had actually _put hands_ on her that she didn’t respond in time to stop him from continuing.

“Cassiel deserved _worse_ than he got!” he yelled. “He was a _demon-summoner,_ Giovanna! That demon yesterday was there because _he_ was the one who figured out to make it work! He was a _necromancer!_ He turned my daughter-in-law’s sister into a _zombie_ because he _killed her,_ and _then_ he thought he could _undo it!_ My _mother_ raised my eldest child because Árpád had a King of Honalee for a mother and I didn’t trust Cassiel not to turn them into some sort of _science experiment!_ I saw Árpád just for holidays for _years_ so he’d be safe, because nothing existed for Cassiel that wasn’t magic, his own work, or right in front of his face! I worked for him for decades, _I know._ ”

 _“János,”_ she heard Roderich snap; and good, because she still needed a second, János had so much _anger_ -

Their son turned on him.

“You don’t even know what he _did!_ ” he yelled at his father. “Cassiel _fed you_ to that demon!”

He’d done _what._

“Cassiel wouldn’t,” Gianna said, voice shaking. “He _wouldn’t._ ”

“He _did,_ ” János said viciously, at least no longer screaming. “He took blood money from organized crime to launch his company and he worked with the Pict even when they’d _told him_ what they’d done to Earth before and he would have killed his son out of neglect if Nia had turned up at just the right time. He didn’t give a _shit_ about anyone but himself and what he wanted- except if _you_ were around, he cared about _you._ You are the _only_ person he ever thought of as actually a _person,_ and not some sort of- some sort of real-life NPC, and he _actively avoided you_ so he wouldn’t have to _deal_ with acknowledging that anyone else deserved some basic fucking safety and decency and _rights_ as he did! He never loved you, Giovanna, not like you did! He didn’t _deserve you!_ ”

 For a moment, it looked like she might yell at him; but then she burst into tears and ran out of the room.

Nico snapped at him in one of languages none of the rest of them understood, clearly giving a reprimand. János growled something back, and Nico’s expression went harder. His next words were sharper. János just scowled in response, and they started staring each other down.

At least her son was listening to _someone_ tell him how completely inappropriate his behavior had been _._

Movement on the edge of her awareness- it was Roderich, coming up next to her. She reached out and clutched his hand tightly. The thought of him, and a demon- she wanted it gone. Roderich was here, he was all right.

For now.

“What did you do to him?” she asked.

Nico broke the staring to answer her.

“Cassiel?” he asked. “He’d avoided actually being around Nia for years, so she couldn’t see the witchcraft he’d been getting up to, but that fell apart about... 2090, I think. We couldn’t kill him- Nia tried, a lot of times, once we’d caught and sentenced him- so we chained him up in Tartarus and left him there.”

“That’s torture,” Tomoko spoke up unexpectedly.

Nico looked at her.

“ _Excuse_ me?” he said, seemingly too taken aback to sound offended.

“That’s torture,” she repeated. “I remember what he said when Giovanna tried to stop him going after people. He kept dying from dehydration. So no one was giving him food or water. You just left him there all alone, didn’t you?”

“Well, yeah,” Nico said, expression sliding into unease. “There was no point in posting a guard. He couldn’t escape, and the only people who went out there were Witchbreaker candidates in their last phase of training. But they didn’t go _in_ Tartarus, just nearby. We could use people better other places.”

“So you left him in solitary confinement,” Tomoko said. “For _entire centuries._ I make and design prosthetics and other medical equipment. I really like my job- but most of those prosthetics? They go to trauma victims, and a lot of the ones I end up working with to make custom ones are war veterans, or people who got caught in wars, because there’s lots of different and complicated ways to get hurt in a war. I have to know about things like PTSD, and lots of general knowledge about all types of war injuries. I know things about torture. Solitary confinement is one of the worst of them, because humans _need_ interaction. It works fast and it hits harder than just about anything else. Common effects are anxiety, hypersensitivity, anger, depression, total social atrophy, suicide attempts, and paranoia and other types of severe breaks from reality. I _just heard_ a whole thing about how he wasn’t a very balanced person already, and what you did to him only made it _worse._ He didn’t think of other people as really people? I’m surprised he even managed to _talk_ to Giovanna and not just shove her around. What I saw in him yesterday- he had a history of killing people already, but he held it together until he nearly died? Dying- the _same trauma_ he’d been living _endlessly_ for lengths of time the human mind really isn’t designed to deal with?”

She crossed her arms.

“I’m not a psychologist,” she said. “But if what I saw yesterday wasn’t a violent reaction to cope with terror at escaping only to find himself back around people who’d drag him back to it as soon as they found out, and paranoia exacerbated by a sudden trigger…”

Total silence in the room.

“That’s on you,” Tomoko concluded. 

“You know what,” János said abruptly. “I don’t care. _Good._ He deserved what he got.”

Erzsébet could not believe that those words had just come out of her son’s mouth.

Everyone was staring at him. He glared around the room, seemingly on general principle, and stalked out.

Nico looked like he was trying to put something together to say, but evidently failed. He followed János after his short, silent struggle for words.

Erzsébet looked at her husband and tried to figure out what they were supposed to do about their son.

* * *

“Ludwig told me that he did not know if he wanted to see you or Feliciano,” had been Cristoforo’s second call, yesterday, a few hours after the first one to inform him of Nia’s death. “But he needs someone he is comfortable showing his emotions to, and I do not think that Feliciano would be a good choice, assuming that she could even keep herself together long enough to _think_ about going to see him. And, Gilbert- they _do_ know, about everything. Nico gave them the book.”

Everyone in Humanity Imperial’s government was in a low panic, but Gilbert had delegated everything that was absolutely necessary to get done _right now_ to other people, and canceled everything else. It was a couple hour’s ship journey to Earth from Helike, and only nerves had kept him from going first thing in the morning.

The flight he took was from the Imperial capital on Helike to the Martigny spaceport, because he was taking the opportunity to deliver some information he didn’t want spread around directly into Ivan’s hands. He got an official welcome at the port, met by some Leutnant from Diplomacy and Public Relations he wasn’t familiar with to escort him up to the Jagdshall, and straight to Ivan’s office.

“The details of division deployments is not sensitive enough information to warrant all this,” Ivan told him, after taking a quick look at the front page of the report Gilbert had handed him.

“Just read it,” Gilbert told him. “Call me if you think we need to talk about it, I’ll come back over here. Anything you’ll _really_ need to talk to me about this should be done in person. I’ve got business in Rome, I’ll be there most of the rest of the day if you happen to need me in the next ten hours or so.”

Ivan would read it, he wasn’t worried about that. But if he didn’t pick up on what Gilbert was trying to tell him, or he only got it after the fact- well, it needed to happen sooner than that. He’d say it outright, if he could.

Treason was a nasty charge, and he could die now.

Getting to Prarayer wasn’t as hard as he’d thought it would be. He was in uniform, and even if people didn’t recognize what the uniform actually _meant,_ it was one. There were no questions about why a person with clear authority would be trying to get up to Court.

The staff at Prarayer knew his face and uniform, and of course he’d had to give his name. _That_ was where he got held up, because security called up to the Executive Manager, who came down to tell him that Marschall Braginski had left orders, undersigned by the Empress, that the time-travelers were not receiving unauthorized visitors.

Gilbert looked at the Executive Manager the way he looked at field agents who’d shown a particularly acute lack of common sense.

“My brother’s up there,” he said. “So, bull _shit_ to your _‘unauthorized visitors’_.”

He pushed past the Executive Manager and shoved one of the security guards when they tried to stop him, half-heartedly. Advantages of elevated status, that most people wouldn’t even try to manhandle you.

The stairs up to the right guest wing were easy enough to find. It was the only one with the wing doors at the top closed.

“No one’s given permission for you to be up there!” the Executive Manager called after him.

Gilbert turned around and leaned over the walkway railing.

“So call Marschall Braginski!” he yelled back down. “And if he complains, tell him to take his head out of his ass and reread the report I gave him!”

The doors to the wing slammed shut behind him in a satisfyingly dramatic fashion.

Of course, this meant that everyone who was currently occupying the wing commons was now staring at him. He felt his posture automatically go into the stiff lines of parade review, old reflexes registering _‘competition’_ , _‘threat’_ , _‘danger’_ in old faces. The feeling was heightened, either because of surprise and no longer being used to seeing these particular Nations, or because none of them were properly Nations right now.

Maybe it was a little of both. That seemed probable, but either way-

 _Stop that,_ he snapped furiously at himself. He had power and command on a scale that none of them had ever even _begun_ to consider. Imagine, maybe. But never for themselves. They were no threat. They could never be any threat, to him or anyone he had to protect.

 _I won,_ he reminded himself. _They lost._

It didn’t feel like winning. They were all looking at him, and he could _feel_ the judgement, and not half an hour ago he’d skated just on the legal side of treason for a government that made him-

Aw hell.

He was _tired._

No. No. He _couldn’t_ be. Not _now._

He forced himself out of parade review, forced himself to take a proper look at the room. Roderich and Erzsébet were out here, and Arthur and Antonio and Francis. Francis and Roderich seemed on the fence about whether to come up and talk to him or not, and he caught both of their eyes, silently trying to convey _‘not now’_.

It seemed like it worked- neither of them moved to intercept him, at least.

Gianna appeared in the hallway entrance.

“Gi-”

Gilbert had never expected to see such a _betrayed,_ tearfully-angry look on his daughter’s face. She glared at him, then turned on her heel and dashed back down the hallway.

He looked back over at the others.

Antonio stood up and came over to him.

“Cassiel,” he said quietly, once he was close enough to be heard. “She’s really upset, and I don’t blame her.”

“He was just going to kill more people,” Gilbert pointed out.

His old friend sighed, took him by the arm, and led him gently out into the wing hallway.

“You’re here to see Ludwig, right?” he asked.

“Who else would I be here for?”

“Well, I figured,” Antonio said. “But I thought I should make sure.”

“So where is he?”

“I have to ask you something first.”

Gilbert hadn’t been expecting that.

“Okay?”

“Gianna is upset,” he said, looking uncharacteristically nervous. “János and Nico and Cristoforo were here yesterday, and-”

He stopped.

“What does Nico actually _do?_ ”

“He’s General of the Sorcerers for the Hunt,” Gilbert told him. “The Workshop- they’re sort of the Hunt’s R&D department but it’s more like experiments in magic, basically any magic developed since about 2100 can be traced at least partly back there- the regular sorcerers assigned out to bases or postings across the galaxy and Honalee, and the Witchbreakers- the Jäger specifically trained to arrest and detain witches until the Jagdsprinz can formally sentence them- they all answer to him. Part of _my_ job is running all of police actions for the Imperial Human State, which means I’ve had a lot of joint meetings with the Hunt to make sure the Witchbreakers and the police are working together smoothly, so I know the generalities of what Nico does for his job. If you want specifics, you’d have to ask him, or Ivan.”

Antonio didn’t look like he liked the idea of having to ask Ivan about anything.

“So the Witchbreakers,” he said. “Do they- how do they do their jobs?”

“That’s a second question,” Gilbert said. “Tonio, what do you _really_ want to ask me?”

“Does my son torture people?”

…okay.

“Where on Earth did you get the idea that _that’s_ what he does?”

His friend looked absolutely miserable.

“Gianna was upset about Cassiel,” he said. “And János started getting angry, and Nico tried to calm it down, and- Gilbert, they had Cassiel in _solitary confinement_ for _centuries._ He’d just die and come back and die and come back. They _tortured him._ ”

“Huh,” was Gilbert’s only real reply. He hadn’t really thought about it like that before.

“He’s your _son!_ ”

“Tonio,” Gilbert said. “We’re friends, so I know you’ll know how serious this was when I tell you about it- I _rejected him._ ”

“But he,” Antonio said, stunned. “He was the only people you had!”

“And if that’s what I got, I didn’t want him,” Gilbert told him. Antonio seemed taken aback by his blunt delivery of the information. “You weren’t there when we found out about the Pict. _He knew_ what they’d done, and he went along with them anyway. He was a menace, and I deserved better than him. _Humanity_ deserved better than him, but that’s they guy we were stuck with developing space travel. I couldn’t trust him after that. No one really did. Not the people who mattered. Tonio- I was _happy_ when I heard the Hunt had finally got him on something.”

“We was your son,” Antonio said, much more weakly this time.

“C’mon, Tonio,” Gilbert said. “I remember having a country. Sometimes, people you like, even people you love like family, can’t be trusted, and you’ve got to do whatever you need to to keep them from hurting other people. Now, I wasn’t there when they figured out what to do with Cassiel-”

“Nico said Nia ordered him confined in Tartarus,” Antonio told him unhappily. “They didn’t have a guard on him, they didn’t feed him- they just _left him_ there. For centuries.”

“Okay, well- maybe they could have done it better,” Gilbert said. “Maybe it would have been nicer to slit his throat and keep him down like a Nation. But the Hunt’s not really about being _nice._ You only get out of things if you’re forgiven, but Nia was never really in that business. She was... always really strict about things when it came to her duties as Jagdsprinz. Maybe it’s because I wasn’t there, or maybe it’s because we were never really _family_ in the way you should be- but honestly, Tonio, I’m really not upset about what happened to Cassiel. You think it wasn’t as bad or worse for Roderich, caught up where that demon could toy with him for years? Cassiel deserved what he got.”

Antonio still didn’t look happy, but he wasn’t arguing about it either.

“Ludwig is the third door on the right,” he told him. “Zell and Heinrich might be in there, I’m not sure. They’ve been clingy, but then sometimes it seems like none of them can get enough space from everyone else.”

“Thanks.”

His friend started to walk away.

“Hey,” Gilbert said, and Antonio stopped. “I’ve learned some shit the last few centuries. If you’re worried about Nico, if you’re worried what he’s done, if it’s bothering you so much about Cass- talk to him about it. Don’t let it sit. It’ll go septic, and you’ll regret it later.”

Antonio smiled, and actually looked like himself again.

“So you _did_ learn how to talk about your feelings!”

“Hey, _hell_ no,” Gilbert told him, unable to resist smiling back. “C’mon, you expected me to change _that_ much?”

“There’s nothing wrong with wishing for a miracle.”

“Yeah, right,” Gilbert said. “But- Tonio?”

“Yes?”

“Nico hasn’t changed that much either,” he told his friend firmly. “He’s not that kind of guy. If he was, Nia would have taken him out herself. She _never_ tolerated that kind of shit, from anybody. However they decided to handle it how they did- it wasn’t because they _wanted_ to torture somebody.”

The answering smile was quieter than the last one, but more heartfelt.

“Go talk to your brother,” Antonio said, waving him on. “He’s hurting, Gil.”

Third door on the right.

It was a lot harder than he wanted it to be to make himself open that door. His stomach was fluttering, and he took his hat off and had to fiddle with the brim for a couple seconds before he could do it.

Ludwig was _right there_ in the small suite sitting room when opened the door, and Gilbert froze up when his brother looked at him.

“Kit,” he managed after a moment. “He’s worried about you. Thought you should have someone to talk to. But I’ll go if you don’t want me.”

“Gilbert,” his brother said, looking faintly puzzled. “Why wouldn’t I want you here?”

Oh, thank you God.

“Kit also said,” Gilbert told him, stepping into the room and closing the door behind him. “That Nico gave you the book. So- there are some things you could, possibly, be mad about.”

Ludwig glanced down at the floor.

“ _‘You don’t want to know if I’m mad’_ ,” he said to himself. “ _‘You want to know if I hate you.’_ ”

“What?”

“It’s something Feli told me once,” Ludwig told him, looking back up. “After- you weren’t there. I… Gilbert, I know that look you have, right now. I’ve had it too. It’s okay. We’re okay.”

Gilbert stood there a second more, still wracked with nervousness; then tossed his uniform hat onto a couch and yanked his little brother into his arms. Ludwig hugged him around his waist, and settled an ear against his chest to listen to his breathing and his heartbeat, like he’d used to do when he was so much smaller.

Some bright, tight emotion welled up in Gilbert. He stuck a hand in Ludwig’s hair and ducked his head, getting as close as he possibly could.

His brother was here. He was _here,_ he had a family again, this wasn’t the bond he’d tried to force on himself about Dietrich, trying to make himself feel something like love out of the minimal respect Dietrich had afforded him as an appreciated-but-avoided senior government official. He’d tried to make that enough, he’d tried to convince himself it was enough all the way up through selling out Earth’s old governments to give Forouzandeh her empire, but this was _real._ This was what he’d been missing, what he’d been wanting for so long.

He snarled wordlessly in his head at that terrifying, newly-recognized _tiredness_ about his life and the power he’d fought for, trying for control and telling himself that Ivan was wrong, Forouzandeh didn’t _own_ him.

So what if it was true that he’d sold himself to keep Dietrich alive, unable to stop the habit of centuries of protecting the integrity of a united Germany even if he had no functioning personal relationship with the man- even thought that decision _had_ been the end of a united German people, everyone being subsumed under _‘Europe’_.

 _This,_ this moment right now, the sight of Ludwig in a place no one had ever imagined he could possibly be, the feel of him, the emotion of it all- he could hold onto this as long as he damn well had to.

He’d fought death before, and like hell he wasn’t going to do it again.   

“We’re really good?” he asked, just to be absolutely certain. “You don’t want an apology? _You,_ I’d apologize to.”

“There’s nothing to apologize for.”

“I lied-”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” Ludwig told him again. “You weren’t doing anything you hadn’t done before. You were trying to protect me. I’ve always known that was your priority. I just never knew you’d gone that far. You didn’t-”

He got a little hint of a tone Gilbert hadn’t heard in centuries, and grinned at, hearing again. Ludwig was getting _embarrassed_ about having _nice feelings._

“You didn’t have to do that,” Ludwig finished saying. “Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” he told him, fluttery feeling expanding from his stomach up into his chest.

“I do,” his brother said. “You deserve to hear it.”

Gilbert wasn’t sure if he wanted to cry, or laugh, or shake himself apart from pure unbelieving _happiness._

Ludwig wasn’t mad at him for lying. Ludwig didn’t hate him for keeping secrets about his past from him.

Nia, he’d always refused, and _would_ refuse, to apologize to for how he’d chosen to handle things. Ludwig- if his little brother had been upset, he’d have gone down on his knees and damn well _begged_ for forgiveness.

“You want to talk about anything?” he asked, so he’d have something to focus on, and keep control of himself.

Ludwig didn’t say anything for a little bit. Gilbert was contentedly existing in attentive silence when his brother, very quietly, hesitantly said:

“Nia?”

“That’s a big topic,” Gilbert said, pulling out of the hug so he could sit next to his brother on the couch. “Anything in particular?”

Ludwig’s shoulders hunched up, and he reached over to gently push them back down.

“It’s okay,” he murmured. “It’s been a shit couple of days. Ask whatever you want.”

“I don’t _understand,_ ” his brother said, and the numb defeat of it broke his heart a little. “Did I even know her? How could she be someone who- did things like- _Feli._ ”

“Losing someone you love can really fuck you up,” Gilbert told him. “And you- you’re really important to all of us, Lutz. When I ran off with Dietrich, it was something that needed doing, but it was a really fucking stupid decision on my part. I don’t know who else could have possibly done what I did for him, but it also totally ruined any chance we had of having any sort of relationship. I wasn’t thinking clearly, and I stayed that way for more years than I like admitting to. I heard- I wasn’t there, and I never got anything concrete out of anyone because at the time I really didn’t care, and by the time I could consider asking it’d been too long and there’d already been too much damage- Heinrich and Lovino and Kit never said anything outright. But Heinrich was living with Feliciano for those years I was gone, and I know Feliciano was really torn up about losing you how we did, and Heinz always watched Feliciano _really_ closely when he wasn’t looking, and so did Lovino and Kit. Heinz in particular didn’t like leaving him alone. I think Feliciano might have- y’know. Tried something. It wouldn’t have been as big a deal for Lovino and Kit, I’m sure they’ve done it too. But Heinz had already lost you when it didn’t make any sense for you to die.”

 Ludwig had flinched, just a little. Gilbert leaned into him.

“You were the most important person in Nia’s life. When we lost you, it was kind of like these last couple of days have been. It came completely out of nowhere, and a lot of really bad shit happened all at once. We lost you, and my secrets came out, and Germany collapsed and a good bit of Berlin was destroyed. That was all on top of six months of your marriage suddenly falling apart, and we didn’t have a reason. We just knew that Feliciano had renounced it in what he’d thought was going to be his last confession. There was a lot of strain already, and then she lost you and her trust in me and her home all at once. The whole family fell apart in the space of less than ten minutes, from when Dietrich woke up to when I finished telling my story, and Nia was there for all of it. From what I was told once I came back with Dietrich, she was bitter about it through those four years, but she wasn’t _angry_ the same way she was later. That came after she was Jagdsprinz.”

“It changed her,” Ludwig said quietly.

“ _Something_ changed,” Gilbert agreed. “Everything got really toxic after that, for a long time. But _she_ mostly changed for the better, really. She got a little too invested in duty and the rule of law, but that’s her job. It was a lot like you, really.”

He nudged his brother, and tried a smile.

“Honest,” he said. “Mostly she was you, but if you replaced the guilt complex with targeted hatred and a tendency towards righteous fury. And she was even getting better about the hatred. For the longest time she couldn’t talk to Feliciano or I, but right after she got married to Odette she went around apologizing to people. Not me. But she went to see Feliciano, and they were able to talk socially after that. I saw them at political functions, and it could get really stiff and awkward, even after forty years, but it was some progress at least.  And you could tell it meant a lot to Feliciano. She and I never got on social terms, but we could have a business meeting together just fine.”

“She _killed_ Feli,” Ludwig said.

Gilbert sighed.

“Lutz,” he said. “I know you don’t like it- but you remember how you felt at the beginning of World War Two. You would have- you _did-_ want blood out of everybody being blamed for how bad everything had gotten and how bitter and upset and discontent people had gotten. That was revenge, and winning, and feeling safe again. That’s the sort of power high Nia was on when she killed Feliciano. That’s what the Hunt’s like. She was getting back the demon that had taken you from her, and she was in control of something again, and there was even a plausible justification for having Feliciano dead for a little bit, and not taking the time to try to talk him out of it. Every Nation has killed for worse reasons than that.”

“And did she-”

Ludwig took a steadying breath.

“The others talked about the János and Gianna,” he said. “How many people did she-”

He couldn’t finish the sentence.

“I have no idea how many,” Gilbert told him. “I’ve never tried to count them all, and I’m sure I don’t know all of them. But Feliciano’s was the only sketchy death she ever dealt, in over six centuries. Mephistopheles was a demon. Reynard Fox was a rapist and a slaver, and so were the rest of the Tylwyth she went after. The witches were witches. She might have gotten a couple of _camorristi_ during the purges, and you know what Italy’s organized crime was like. Anybody she personally killed while trying to break up a war would have been self-defense. She didn’t go out just slaughtering people, and she’s definitely got a smaller death toll than basically everyone else we know. If she didn’t have to kill somebody, she didn’t kill somebody.”

There were deep lines in his brother’s face. He looked very sad, and solemn, the way he always had when he’d been thinking about his own faults.

“So,” Ludwig said after a moment. “The Hunt? All of this… empire?”

“I’m not the person to ask about that, Lutz,” Gilbert said. “I know the briefing summaries, but I didn’t work for her or with her, and none of us ever lived together as a family after we lost you. You want to ask Ivan or Nico or Lord Hiruz- he’s one of the second-in-commands of the Hunt, Ivan’s the other one- or Arik or Isolde or Michele- Nia’s eldest kids, Isolde and Michele are Nations, Arik’s… well, _biologically,_ he’s Cass’s son, but Nia adopted him before he was a week old. Or Odette, she hasn’t been involved with the Hunt and in the _Großjagdsreich_ ’sgovernment very long because they got married within this last century, but she was born soon after the book ended. Or- I don’t know how much Kit could tell you because he definitely kept things in confidence for her, but she never fought with him, and she stayed Catholic her whole life. And if you decide you want to try to talk to Feliciano, he’d know some things about her, too. At the least he’d be able to talk about what she was like recently. But if you want to know about her and the Hunt- Ivan’s the one you want.”

“That might be one of the strangest things,” Ludwig said after a moment. “ _Russia_ works for Nia.”

Oh, so it was a blatant topic change. Not that surprising, and he had plenty of things he could talk about that _weren’t_ to do with the fuck-up their family had turned into.

“You want to hear the story of how it happened?” Gilbert offered.

“Yes.”

* * *

She, surprisingly, had woken up.

She hadn’t really been expecting that. It was nice.

Except she couldn’t fell the Hunt. Or Marschall Braginski. Or _Bisnonno._

The demon-

She tried to get out of the hospital bed, but a horrible wrenching pain tore through her abdomen when she tried to swing her legs down to the floor.

“Nnughhhh,” Emma groaned as some hospital staff came running at whatever alerts she’d triggered at the nurse’s station by moving. Two of the nurses carefully put her back into the totally prone position she’d been in before.

It was very uncomfortable.

The doctor glared at her over the display of her medical and treatment information.

“I know _exactly_ how old you are, Leutnantkommandant,” she scolded. “You should know better than to try that.”

“Wanted to get up,” Emma grumbled. “Where-”

“We’re going to _check you_ before we let you try that,” the doctor said sternly. “Those are some very nasty knives you carry. The initial stab went through the upper section of your large intestine and the lower portion of your stomach. When you collapsed, the blade was forced up at an angle, going through the rest of your stomach, tearing much of the important muscles in your lower back, and cutting into your liver. You’ve escaped infection so far, but the healing process is going to be a long one. Shorter than it could have been, since the Hunt _does_ have some sorcerers with a bit of training in medicine, but long enough. You’re going to be on medical leave for the foreseeable future-”

That implied that there _was_ still a Hunt to put her in that category in the first place, but-

 _“Medical leave!”_ she exclaimed, indignant. She had- _things_ to do! Her _Nonna_ was here!

“Don’t argue with _me_ about it,” the doctor told her. “Marschall Braginski left orders to be called when you woke up, so he’s on his way down here. In the meantime, we’re going to determine if you’re healed enough to sit up and try solid foods.”

Sitting up was fine so long as she had back support, but trying move sideways, or her legs, or twist her torso at all hurt too much. The doctor grudgingly agreed to let her try a wheelchair, so by the time Marschall Braginski arrived, she was sitting up in the chair with the aid of a back brace, and could be independently mobile.

She’d had some idea of asking if a sündeyalacgh could be found to check out her soul, just in case, and demanding that Marschall Braginski not put her on leave, only desk duty; but as soon as he walked in she blurted: “I can’t feel you,” in a much more vulnerable tone than she liked.

Marschall Braginski sighed dejectedly through his nose, ordered the doctor and nurses out, and sat down to tell her everything she’d missed.

The galaxy had managed to go to shit in only four days, and Emma was not about that. 

“So I’m not fit for field duty,” she said- which was a crying shame, because that’s _exactly_ where the Hunt needed people right now, and she was one of the best. “Take someone off processing paperwork and give it to me.”

Marschall Braginski frowned at her, just a little.

“We need everyone who specializes in administration right where they are,” he said. “Disorganization could mean disaster.”

“I know I didn’t do a good enough job with the kids,” she tried instead. “But I could-”

“Reno and Nadri are in the Jagdshall, confined to their guest rooms,” he cut her off. “They need no guards. We are not worried about them escaping. Reno turned _himself_ in, and Nadri will not leave without him.”

“Then assign me to Prarayer,” Emma said.

“No.”

“ _Yes,_ sir,” she insisted. “Whoever you have there now-”

“There is no one stationed in Prarayer.”

“Then it may as well be me! Anyone else who knows the languages fluently enough is in High Command, or they’re needed on the border with the Silent Hills or the Pict. I _can’t_ be, so send me. I can bully the staff into keeping strictly to colony rules.”

Marschall Braginski raised an eyebrow at her.

“C’mon, Marschall,” Emma said. “What _else_ were you going to do? They’re seven centuries out of their own time. This may as _well_ be an alien world to them. We eat food that didn’t _exist_ when they were alive- what if they’re deathly allergic? And just having a bad reaction because they’re not used to alien food substances could mask them catching one of the diseases from _now_ that they don’t have any immunity to. Colony rules are the only thing that would keep them _alive._ I was with the Theiostea mission right alongside you, and then I was on other ones. I _know_ what precautions you’re supposed to take to keep humans alive in a foreign environment.”

“The staff at Prarayer are sufficiently terrified by me,” Marschall Braginski told her dryly. “I would hate to inflict you upon them as well. They have done nothing wrong.”

“But if something goes wrong, the staff doesn’t speak the language,” Emma argued. “And if they want something, it will take a damn long time to ask for. It’ll be pantomime and picture-drawing again. I can answer questions they have about things, too. Like history. Maybe not details about personal messes, but I’m old enough to have learned about that 2053-2080 period as recent history in school, and then I _remember_ the rest of it. You’re not going to get anyone better to assign and you know it.”

“You killed Cassiel Navin, Leutnantkommandant,” he reminded her. “Your grandmother is very upset about that.”

“I can handle her,” Emma said. She _could._ “It’s not like I’m twenty or thirty any longer, Marschall. She doesn’t scare me and I don’t need her approval. Anyway-”

Marschall Braginski’s eyes narrowed at her newly-confident tone.

“There _has_ to be a doctor hired for Prarayer,” she said. “To do the best they can to keep them from catching something like ship cough or henovirus, or all the fun modern variants on diphtheria and plague and pox from the mutated strands out of Honalee. Or what about Flavian fever? That’s still mutating faster than we can keep up with and killing people. Or you know, SARS E is back. And they were in Kharad, I bet they had plenty of opportunity to catch traveler’s flu. Oh, and I bet they’ll _love_ to hear about HICV, there’s nothing like a good AIDS scare and this time it _is_ actually conventionally contagious! They don’t even have to get sick, they just have to turn into carriers and bring a bunch of totally new diseases back to the mid twenty-first century. And it’s not like _they’re_ not carrying bacteria and mutations of viruses that nobody’s seen in centuries which _we_ haven’t got herd immunity for any longer-”

“ _That’s enough,_ Leutnantkommandant.”

She could push just a _little_ further.

“All I’m saying is,” Emma told him. “Is that if you haven’t already got a doctor over there, it’s only because you’re waiting for a really good one to get back to you about accepting the job. And any doctor good enough for _that_ is good enough to keep me from getting some sort of deadly infection in sensitive vital organs, or tearing the wound open again.”

Marschall Braginski glared at her.

She just smiled back.

“Very well,” he said eventually. “There is a doctor arriving in Prarayer on Sunday. You _will_ stay here overnight, and when I come back tomorrow I will speak to the staff here, and if _they_ stay you can leave under supervision, then you may go. Though, I suppose-”

He looked thoughtful for a moment.

“Regardless of your medical status,” he continued. “Clearly, you are concerned with having nothing to do. With being of no use. So- I will have a puzzle for you, when I return tomorrow. The General is being very obtuse, and spying is _your_ job.”

* * *

The funeral was held on the fifth of October, five days after the demon. It had ended up being at the horse farm, in a nice out-of-the-way place. Árpád had had to organize it, because he’d been too angry to go back to Prarayer and talk to Lana’s family there about the arrangements. There were nine of them there- himself, Edward, Irene, England, Árpád, Terenzia, Vasco, Nico, and the Vatican, to conduct the service. It was simple enough, and didn’t take very long even though they had three bodies to bury.

János didn’t cry once. After the outburst yesterday at Prarayer, he’d suddenly burnt out an hour or so later, and been numb ever since.

Terenzia and Vasco took the Vatican back home, then Irene and England to Prarayer, and Edward to Martigny. He didn’t know what Irene and England were going to do, but he knew that Terenzia was going to help Vasco corner his boyfriend and do their best to make him feel better.

Árpád and Nico stayed to drag him into the farmhouse, currently vacated by the Hunt for the occasion, and get him slightly drunk. He was hoping that having his inhibitions lowered would do something about the non-feeling. Crying until he went hoarse maybe wouldn’t be objectively _better-_ but he couldn’t shake the feeling that this had been a funeral, and he hadn’t cried, and he was a bad person for it.

“I’m _mad,_ ” he said instead, about a little over half an hour of slow, quiet drinking. “They’re dead, and I know whose fault it is, and no one’s taking them to task for it, and I’m _mad._ But I’m not-”

He waved a hand vaguely, trying to show the sensation of both _feeling_ and _non-feeling_ at once.

“Cassiel’s dead,” Nico reminded him.

“Yeah,” János said, staring at his glass. “ _Yeah._ He was the one with the magic and stuff. But. _But._ Ereshkigal _let it happen._ Maybe this one isn’t a really good example. But _Nia._ ”

Would they have a funeral for her? _Could_ they? There was no body, so there couldn’t be anything like a public viewing, but they’d need something official. A day of mourning wouldn’t be enough, and he wasn’t sure a memorial service would cut it. There were maybe twenty people in the entirety of Honalee and humanitystill left alive who remembered a time when Nia hadn’t been Jagdsprinz; and not that many more, speaking in terms of the total population, who remembered a time before she’d also been running the network of semi-independent states that had become the _Großjagdsreich._

She’d been a _King._ Regular kings got big funerals. He had no idea what Honalenier ones got, but they’d been starting to see how deeply Nia’s absence was affecting people. It wasn’t just, or even mostly, the civil war in the Silent Hills or the threatening Pict- it was the sense of loss of an era, an institution, something _fundamental_ to how the world was supposed to work.

So only a handful of people knew that she was actually dead. What Ereshkigal had done had been captured on camera, and it had been five days since anyone had seen Nia. Everyone had noticed how they weren’t getting a straight answer about if she was dead or not, and what that meant for the rest of the galaxy. People weren’t _stupid._

At least they seemed willing to keep sort-of quiet about it until someone said something officially. János had seen Sankt Michelmarc, and gone back to the Honalenier pagan’s High King shrine, and been to check on Kharad and confirmed that there weren’t any _Hedahrene_ left from the deaths. People were leaving flowers, and handwritten notes, and candles. The High King’s statue looked very odd with saint’s medals- Michael, Mark, Mary, Catherine- on the altar, or left hanging on nearby trees; and if all the things left outside the Governor’s Residence weren’t for Nia, well, he knew that some of them _were._ It wasn’t _huge._

But it wasn’t small, either. And the Disrägner in the Jägerskov were doing things, too. Azadran had kept her mouth shut, but it wasn’t like he’d kept the fact that he’d been looking for someone to tell him about angry ghosts a secret. Probably all of Honalee had figured out what that meant by now.

“Nia,” Nico agreed grimly. “Just what _were_ you doing up at the High King’s shrine a couple of days ago, anyway? I don’t see how that has anything to do with souls. You don’t usually work like that.”

János explained.

“Oh,” Árpád said, a few moments after he’d finished. “So- you did what Ahes did? You promised to get the debt paid.”

“Well,” János started to tell his eldest child, and then stopped.

That wasn’t really… _wrong._ That hadn’t really been what he’d been intending, but you could put it like that.

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I guess I did. So I have to figure out what I’m going to do about it.”

“It’s kinright, _Apa_.”

“Vendetta,” Nico agreed thoughtfully. “You’re one of her cousins. You count as family she has left. Without the Hunt, it’d be part of your responsibility anyway.”

“Ereshkigal?” János said. All of the difficulties in getting revenge for Nia were wrapped up in that one word.

“ _Seelenkind_ ,” Árpád countered. “You remember what the Jagdsprinz said. She’s _scared_ of us. We’re powerful enough to challenge her.”

János looked at them, and Árpád looked at him, and so did Nico, and both of them looked at Nico; and the silence stretched.

“ _She’s_ the one who broke the Hunt,” Nico said eventually. “I know how Mosè is interpreting the law, and maybe he’s not all wrong. But Maria _put it back,_ as much as she could. We could have worked with the Jagdsprinz only being tied to Nia. It would have taken time and experimentation, but that’s nothing we’re not used to. _Ereshkigal_ is the one who banished it.”

“Witchcraft,” Árpád said quietly. “Killing a King, and interfering with and usurping their power. And that’s besides what the Jagdsprinz itself said about her.”

“I’m not part of the Hunt,” János pointed out.

“ _We_ are,” Nico said. There was a new light in his eyes. “And we’re _Witchbreakers._ ”

Lana had been too, János remembered, and took another sip of alcohol. It didn’t seem to be accomplishing what he wanted it to, but at least he wasn’t feeling so bad about not crying, now.

“Killing a King is witchcraft,” he said, putting his glass down on the table with a firm _tmp_. “But killing a _witch_ is justice.”


	12. Star-Crossed

Magda Eisenhart looked at the empty warehouse, then over at the empty landing field, and then back at the depot captain.

“You’re sure they’re not just late?” she asked.

The depot captain didn’t look at all annoyed at being asked such an unnecessary question. In its own way, that was deeply unreassuring.

“Been two weeks since the next ships were supposed to come in,” he told her again. “Three weeks since Kharad, when they all buggered off like somebody had lit a fire under them. They’ve never been late since the depot’s been here. _Centuries_ it’s been, and they’ve come down in storm and wind and flood and epidemic-”

He spread his arms wide, indicating the total current lack of any of those things; and the unspoken context of the moment.

“Yeah,” Magda said, too tired from three weeks of being constantly on edge to even summon up the terror she’d always anticipated this moment bringing. “Yeah. All right.”

She walked off far enough away into the warehouse to be out of earshot, and keyed her two-way into the line specifically set up for this situation.

“Alert One,” she sent out to the Hunt. “Pict Dominion has broken contact. Repeat, Alert One. This is General Magda Eisenhart, assuming command of the front line. Confirmation, Alert One.”

* * *

Emma was just happy that Intelligence and Internal Affairs drilled all of their Jäger into the habit of keeping their two-way earpieces in, because it meant that the Thálassian doctor hired for Prarayer, sitting next to her at the table, couldn’t hear the alert.

The doctor looked at her funny anyway.

“Figured something out about the report?” he asked. Emma hadn’t made a secret of the fact that she was trying to puzzle out a message from a report she’d been given- the doctor didn’t have anyone to tell, and none of the time travelers _could_ tell anyone. Some of them had been putting a significant amount of effort into trying to learn enough of one of the modern languages to communicate, since they had so much free time to eat up, but none of them were good enough for long sentences yet.

“No,” Emma told her, and pointed to her ear. “Hunt news.”

“Oh,” he said. “Is Marschall Braginski not coming, then?”

“Hasn’t said he’s not.”

Emma wasn’t sure if he’d put off coming or not. He’d been planning this for a week or so, and it wasn’t like coming to Prarayer was going very far from Martigny. The Hunt had been preparing for this eventuality for a long time, and everyone had been brushing up on procedure and theoretical strategies since Serafina DiAngeli had stormed off. Even with the difficulties of trying to talk to Nanshe, they were as prepared as they were going to get. Marschall Braginski could probably afford to be gone for a few hours.

* * *

Ivan had been about to leave when Magda called in. He sensed a certain stillness descend suddenly upon the Jagdshall as everyone realized that they might have just gotten the first wind of real war with the Pict.

“Ilya,” he told his AI. “Please ask Ahes if she has heard back from her mother yet.”

He put a little more work into tidying up his desk while he waited for Ilya to get back to him. The last two weeks had been very quiet, but very strained. It had generated a lot of paperwork, especially once Legal had gotten into the real details of whether or not the Hunt still had any sort of legal authority without the Jagdsprinz physically around to back them.

Everyone had been waiting for the disaster to strike, and, well, here it was.

Ivan wasn’t certain if he preferred the possibility of an imminent Pict invasion to the prospect of facing an official challenge to the Hunt’s legal authority. It was only going to be a matter of time, after all. Invasion by the Pict would supersede any complicated legal questions- but whether one option or the other was more dangerous to the galaxy, he just didn’t know.

There was a quick knock on his doorframe, and Nico stuck his head in.

“I am taking no reports at the moment, General-”

“No reports,” Nico told him, sounding a little anxious. “We still haven’t really got any ideas- I had a question.”

“Oh?”

“Is it still torture if you didn’t mean to?”

Ivan stared at him a moment.

“What?” he asked, startled, trying to think of a situation where you could _possibly_ torture someone without meaning to.

 _‘Ahes hasn’t heard anything yet,’_ Ilya told him in his ear. _‘But she says she’s going back to speak her mother right now to get an answer about why she hasn’t heard anything.’_

“Tomoko said,” Nico continued, fidgeting. “When János and I went to tell them about Nia. I’ve been thinking about it since then but I can’t decide and you, uh, know about this sort of thing.”

The only person Tomoko knew about who Nico had done anything to was Cassiel, but-

Ivan frowned at him slightly, and re-evaluated six hundred-some years of service to the Wild Hunt.

“Is this about Cassiel?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Nico said, agitated. “Tomoko said- we didn’t _realize_ that was what that meant, we just needed somewhere to keep him locked up away from everything else forever-”

“You did not _realize,_ ” Ivan cut him off flatly.

Nico looked stricken.

“ _You_ did?”

“Of course _I_ did,” Ivan told him. “I have, as you said, _experience_ in this area. Now you are telling me that none of you- not Nia, not Árpád, not yourself, _no one_ who was there in Tartarus when Cassiel was condemned- _none of you_ took a moment to _think_ about what you were doing?”

“We thought about it!” Nico protested. “We couldn’t kill him-”

“But you knew he could still _die,_ ” Ivan said. “Right now, Nicodemo Agresta, I am not certain if I want to be disgusted at the collective thoughtlessness of you and yours, or reassured that your innocence and naivety in the matter of ways in which to hurt people has kept you blind to the implications for so many centuries.”

“If it helps,” Nico said quietly. “I’m horrified with myself.”

“Well,” Ivan said, after a considering pause. “You would not be the person I have worked beside for so long if you were not.”

“Are you going to Prarayer?”

“I was asked to,” Ivan reminded him. “And it is a small something I can do, to provide a bit of comfort and a bit of remembrance to my Prince.”

“Can I come with you?” Nico asked. “I owe Gianna an apology. Somehow.”

“That is not something that can really be apologized for.”

“Well, it’s all I can really do at this point.”

Ivan didn’t mind bringing Nico along. It was just a step through the World Gate, after all.

Emma smiled widely at them when they arrived in the wing’s common area, sitting with the doctor.

“We were just talking about you,” she said, and saluted both of them.

The other Nations were lurking in the common area too, ostensibly socializing but _really_ on the lookout for information about the current situation- and, especially in the absence of facts, something to speculate and gossip about.

It had been a long time since he’d had a proper gossip about his neighbor’s personal lives and what other people’s bosses were getting up to, Ivan realized suddenly. No one gossiped with the Wild Hunt. He found he missed it, in a weird, distantly nostalgic way. He wouldn’t want to be back in those days for anything, but…

“They should be waiting for you, Marschall,” Emma continued, breaking through his thoughts. “Third door on the right. Do you need something, General Agresta?”

“He has an apology to make,” Ivan told Emma, and left her to handle it. He had a visit to keep.

Zell was on the couch of the suite Nia’s family was sharing, looking as proper as he remembered her from hundreds of UN meetings, with Heinrich next to her, wrapped up in a blanket. Germany was sitting in one of the chairs with a book, reading glasses on.

Ivan hadn’t known Germany used glasses.

Germany looked up, and Ivan saw a single moment of the man unguarded, without the stiff formality he remembered from meetings. Without it, Germany looked both younger and older, and had a certain quiet, tired melancholy.

But a second, and then his expression switched straight into businesslike. Ivan was tempted to remind him that this wasn’t a meeting, but they didn’t have that type of relationship. They weren’t familiar, or even particularly friendly with each other. The last Germany remembered of him, Ivan had been bitter and cynical and pessimistic enough that people actively avoided him. He was much better these days, but none of these three knew that.

Well, time to surprise them, then.

 Ivan gave them one of his offhanded friendly, reassuring smiles, and took his dress uniform hat off to place on the table. The books he’d brought went down on the table as well, in front of Zell.

Germany was still sitting frozen with his glasses half-off when he looked up again.

“What, you expected me to be exactly as I was before?” he asked. “Preposterous. I have lived close to half my life as the Hunt and not as Russia, and I am much better for it.”

He took the other chair in the room as Zell blinked at the books he’d brought, and reached for the top one.

“I know this?” she said, sounding unsure even as she picked up the first volume of _Die Seleenvolksrecht._ It was a reprint in the newest edition from twenty years ago, commissioned in the way that Nia liked them- the parts from the first edition still in the Standard German she’d grown up with, and with all later laws in Farsuá or Martinacher or the other languages in two-column translations back into German, so she could see both.

Zell opened it to the title page, which held the list of every subsequent editor and their edition. Her name was first, naturally; and he knew from memory the way she was listed: _Maria Gisela Beilschmidt, 1 st Ed. (2105)_.

“I never thanked you for that,” Ivan told her, inclining his head at the books. “It took some time past your death for the effects of what you compiled, and what you taught- you were a professor in your later years, at Fürsten Universität Martinach- to be fully realized.”

He paused a moment to do a calculation.

“There are ninety-eight Nations alive today,” he said. “Twenty of them survive from your present, and are today known as the old Nations. Three occupy an awkward middle position- Dietrich Ehren, now Europe; and Isolde and Michele Beilschmidt, Fürstentum Martinach and the Republic Protectorate of Rome, the two oldest parts of the _Groβjagdsreich_ \- because they were born as the world as you knew it was passing, but the beginnings of the world now had not yet begun. The other seventy-five are Nations not of Earth, but space, and they are the young, or new, Nations. Of these ninety-eight Nations, _seventy-three_ have _never_ been under orders, never feared for their self-possession, and lived assured with the safety of having that self-possession _law._ ”

The looks on their faces were something to see- Heinrich was still mostly composed, but Zell had a quiet, fierce hope at this news, and Germany a sort of desperate longing he wasn’t hiding as well as he probably thought he was.

“In some five centuries or so,” Ivan continued. “Only _one_ human has ever violated that law, and it was to save his Nation and his people while under hostile occupation. Both the Jagdsprinz and the Nation in question forgave him under the law, given the extenuating circumstances, and only barred him from ever serving public office again. He went home, wrote out his farewells, and killed himself. It is still considered an act of moral heroism, three centuries later.”

He looked Zell dead in the eyes.

“ _That_ is your legacy,” he told her. “The young Nations can call us bitter and paranoid and hateful and controlling, because they have _never_ had to fear their people, or loathe their leaders. They have, for the most part, been safe, content, and happy. There have been difficulties. Some have been killed, or lived for a time in fear, or wept because their people were hurting- but they have not _suffered;_ not as we have. In a large part it is because _you_ cared so much for those of us who did, and gave us the labor of your life. There is not thanks enough any one of us could give you, to repay that debt.”

Zell was holding the first volume of her law compilation tight enough to make her knuckles white.

“You don’t owe me,” she said faintly.

“Perhaps you do not feel so,” Ivan said. “But I am _Razanás Wildes Jagd,_ and I must acknowledge that debt.”

“What does _‘Razanás’_ mean?” Heinrich asked.

“It is Honalenier Trade Creole,” Ivan explained. “It is the title for a King of Honalee, a Nation. They are one and the same, in social and legal function and origin, if not in details. I am _Razanás._ Your parents are _Razanásan_. Nia was _Razanás;_ and now I hear that people have been extending the same to János for what he has accomplished, though he holds no position that would warrant it.”

“So,” Heinrich said, and didn’t seem to know where to go from there. “Nia.”

Germany shifted in his seat.

“Gilbert said I should talk to you,” he said. “If I wanted to know about Nia.”

“What do you want to know?”

“I-”

Her father was groping for words.

“What was her life like?” he asked, sounding lost. “What did she _do?_ ”

That was very broad.

“She enforced international law,” Ivan decided to tell him, because it seemed like something he’d like to hear. “She kept peace- which has lasted for centuries at a time, all through the galaxy- and stopped wars in their tracks when she could. She ended the human trafficking of Honalee, and gave what aid the Hunt could, with our resources, to ending human rights violations of all sorts on Earth and then in the space colonies. She intimidated and threatened and otherwise bullied Earth’s governments into accepting the Hunt’s and Nations’ authority; and was the other part of how today, no Nation has anything to fear from humans. She saved me from the trap of Russia, which I have only self-destructed over again and again- she gave me a place to heal in safety and the chance to make up for all the things that I have done. She built an empire from a dozen people in a house on the mountainside in Switzerland and the money of her inheritance from you, and it is an empire founded without conquest, without slaughter, without intent of exploitation or malice. She raised thirteen children, most of whom call me _‘Uncle Vanya’_. She married once for politics and once for love. She strove for flawless execution of her duty, and felt responsibility personally, because she always tried to live and act in a way she thought you would approve of.”

Ivan tilted his head just a bit, considering something.

“Ludwig,” he said, the name and the familiarity it implied sounding odd to them both. “Your children have done you proud. They changed the course of history because of how fiercely they love you.”

The other man looked uncomfortably embarrassed about that. Ivan supposed this was understandable, but it still seemed like the wrong reaction to him.

“But she changed,” Ludwig said after a few moments. “She loved me, but she’s- the Nia who- died, three weeks ago. I didn’t know her.”

“I cannot fix that,” Ivan told him. “I can only tell you that she had a good life, that she was happy and liked and respected, and lived with honor where she was not hampered with anger and an inability to forgive. She was no one you would have begrudged the time to relearn; and she was no one you would not have been able to love.”

* * *

Ivan had said that apologies weren’t really adequate for this situation, and Nico agreed wholeheartedly with him, but also wasn’t sure what else he was supposed to do. No one had _meant_ to do that to Cassiel, because they’d all _known_ that he couldn’t die, and the best they could do was keep him locked up somewhere. With the magic he could muster, and the way that none of them trusted him around other people, Tartarus had been the ideal place. It was _meant_ as a jail originally, anyway, and they’d all known that Seelenkind didn’t just _die._

But they’d been wrong, and it had turned into something it shouldn’t, and Nico wasn’t totally sure how he was supposed to apologize for something like this.

In the end, he settled for looking Giovanna dead in the eyes when Emma brought her to the common area, no matter how much he wanted to look at the floor or the wall behind her instead.

“I’m sorry,” he told her. “The best I can say is that I swear that none of us were intending that. There’s some things that don’t deserve forgiveness or mercy, and Cassiel did a lot of them, but that doesn’t mean they warrant outright malice. Torture isn’t how the Hunt is supposed to do things. It’s- I don’t expect you to understand, and I don’t know how much it will help or mean anything, but it’s _wrong._ ”

“I know torture is wrong,” Gianna said. There was a certain hard edge in her look that very clearly said that she didn’t entirely trust that _he_ knew that.

“Well, yes, it’s wrong,” Nico said. “But it’s- antithetical. Anathema. Torture and the Hunt, that’s- _‘unthinkable’_ isn’t the right word either, and it’s not strong enough.”

As he’d expected, Gianna was looking a bit confused, and still angry.

Nico sighed.

“It’s a disgrace,” he told her. “A shame- shame on me, shame on the Hunt. In the serious way, the _old_ way, and-”

He sighed again, because his cousin’s eyes had narrowed and her lips had pursed in a way he bet meant she was equating _‘shame in the old way’_ on old aristocrat’s honor duels over social snubs, which was _not_ the magnitude of what he meant.

“I owe you a debt,” Nico said. It was true, if not the real nuances and depth of the situation. “I don’t know how it will be arbitrated to just value, since we haven’t got a Jagdsprinz-”

Very suddenly, Gianna went from restrained anger to furious crying, bursting into tears just a bare second before she slapped him across the face.

She heaved a particularly hoarse breath, looked at the reddening skin where the blow had fallen, and managed to get a pretty sincere: “I’m sorry” through the sobbing before turning and walking quickly out of the room, in the particular way of someone who was trying not to run.

In the strange twisty way emotions could get, Nico felt guilty about making Gianna slap him. He tried to stomp on that thought, because _she_ had been the only one involved in that decision, and understanding _why_ someone had done something was a good skill to have- but the guilt was still there, regardless.

“Nico,” his father said quietly.

* * *

He and Antonio and Austria and Hungary had been having a conversation, on and off, about what to do about their sons. It wasn’t a very pleasant conversation, but worse than that it hadn’t been a very _productive_ one. They’d had three weeks, and just kept circling back to the fact of _torture._

And it was tangled up in a bunch of other things, too- being in a time that no one had been able to come to terms with yet, the murders of family Austria and Hungary had never met, a really _nasty_ surprise about Feliciano for himself, and the unsettling omnipresent _lack_ that seemed to pervade everything, no matter that none of _them_ had ever lived in a world where the Jagdsprinz mattered that much.

Lovino had not been having a very good couple of weeks, but Nico’s arrival, what he’d said to Gianna, and the lost look on his face at how the conversation fell out-

“Nico,” he said, and his son turned to him, looking like he expected the verbal equivalent of the slap he’d just gotten. Lovino held his arms open, and his son relaxed just a fraction, and sat down on the floor next to him to huddle against his legs.

“Should I not have brought up the Jagdsprinz?” he asked.

Antonio reached over and put his hand in his hair. Lovino shared a look with him over Nico’s head; and behind his husband, the other Nations were not doing a very good job at pretending to not be paying attention. He singled out Norway for a glare, but he only looked back impassively for a couple of seconds before deliberately going back to the Martinacher language lesson he had pulled up.

“Well, that was probably it,” Antonio told their son, and Lovino decided that England deserved an entire hand gesture in addition to the glare, on the grounds that he was sitting right next to France and the two of them were the nosiest busybodies in the entire hemisphere, but they got exponentially worse with the other around to egg him on. “But not in the way you think, I think.”

His husband looked beseechingly at him, and so Lovino huffed and stopped with the gesturing and the glaring, even though _some people_ definitely deserved it for prying into personal business.

“How old were you when you joined the Hunt, Nico?” he asked instead.

His son had to think about it, and count some things silently on his fingers.

“Forty,” he said.

“And how many years have you been in the Hunt?”

Nico didn’t have to think about that answer.

“Six hundred and ninety-three.”

Simple arithmetic came automatically to Lovino, and he was disquieted by the total it came up with. He pushed the thought aside, because worrying about centuries could happen later.

“How much do you _remember_ from before you joined?”

“Enough,” Nico said. “Why?”

“The Wild Hunt isn’t an acceptable justice system to Gianna,” Antonio pointed out. “It doesn’t have any authority to her.”

“I know that,” Nico said. “But it has authority _here._ We _are_ the authority. That’s why this is such a problem-”

“Honalee,” Antonio interrupted gently. “Is particularly… _practical_ about wrongdoings and restitution.”

 _‘Practical’_ wasn’t the word Lovino would have chosen, but _‘cold-blooded and legalistic’_ was less diplomatic, and that was the difference between the two of them.

“You ran head-first into a cultural misunderstanding,” Lovino told his son.

“I knew that too,” Nico said. “Before I started. That’s why I tried to explain.”

He was completely missing the point, and Lovino didn’t know how he felt about it, that it was so clear and _right there_ to him, but apparently not so for his son. Nico had lived this mindset, once- so why couldn’t he _understand_ it?

“When you talk about shame and disgrace and owing a debt and just arbitration,” Lovino said, before Antonio could try to be nice about it and drag it out. “ _We_ know what you mean. It’s all about doing right, and doing wrong and _making_ right, out in public where everyone knows, because you live and die by your reputation; and reputation isn’t decided by you, it’s all on the word of others, and there’s always that _one_ person whose word counts above everyone else’s, when it comes to reputation and rectifying your shame, because somebody’s got to be able to have the final word. But when _Gianna_ hears that same thing, that’s not what she’s thinking. She’s hearing _‘I’m sorry, but mostly I want you not to be mad at me, how much money will it take?’_.”

Confusion crossed Nico’s face.

“But I’m not trying to get her to sue me,” he said. “I mean, she _could._ We’d get her lawyers, we do that, we’ve got some really good ones. And- okay, debt, but I didn’t say a thing about money.”

“You didn’t have to,” Lovino said. “That’s what she’s used to. Someone gets killed unlawfully, the government issues an official apology- if you’re _lucky-_ and you might get some money in compensation. Did you forget that?”

 _“No!”_ Nico exclaimed. “But she _does_ know what I was talking about- she really likes small communities, and small communities are where the sort of reputation policing is strongest-”

Antonio made a soft little noise, and Nico stopped talking.

“We’re having another cultural misunderstanding right here,” he said. “You and us, Nico, we’re used to the idea of it being _institutionalized._ We’ve lived it. Gianna hasn’t. That’s not a way to justice for her, it’s just… how being social works. And it’s not as strict as what we’re used to.”

Nico slumped a little, accepting the misunderstanding; and this was why sometimes he really needed to let Antonio talk to people and not do it himself.

“So I should try to apologize about this, too?”

“No,” Lovino said firmly. “She’ll still be upset. She won’t understand it anyway. You could try to explain it again, but it’s not what she knows and it’ll never feel like enough, or the right thing, no matter what _you_ think about it.”

“Tell us about what you’ve been doing,” Antonio suggested. “We’ve missed you.”

 _And we could use some more explanations,_ Lovino mentally added. The other Nations were blatantly listening in now, no pretenses about doing anything else- well, fine. This was news and a bit of family gossip, Antonio would have ended up sharing it all anyway, happily chattering it at France or Austria or Hungary.

“I would have come back,” Nico said. “But I’ve been busy. And I didn’t want to come back until I’d thought about what Tomoko said.”

Antonio started stroking Nico’s hair.

“Oh?” Lovino asked, not trying to make it sound like it wasn’t a leading question.

For a moment, he didn’t say anything. Then, quietly-

“Ivan figured out what was happening to Cassiel, but he thought we did it on purpose, so he never _said_ anything.”

“He’s _Russia,_ ” Lovino reminded his son.

“No he’s not,” Nico said immediately. “He’s the Wild Hunt. _Razanás Wildes Jagd,_ and Marschall of the Hunt. Everyone’s expecting him to take over from Nia.”

There was a choking noise from another part of the room. Austria had picked the wrong time to have more water.

 _“Him?”_ Norway spoke up, packing as much scorn and disbelief as he could into the one word. “As _Jagdsprinz?_ ”

Nico pushed back from Lovino’s legs so he could look at everyone else.

“Yes,” he said firmly. “You probably don’t believe it, but he’s a good person, and I trust him. He’s still a bit of a pessimist, but that’s the practicality of a hard life talking, and he’s an idealist at heart, and he won’t stop fighting. He can be grim and hard, but it means he’ll do what has to be done.”

“He-” Austria started to say, hotly.

“Has had a lot of time to become that person,” Antonio interrupted smoothly. “But what about other things, Nico? There was something about a war-”

“You heard about that here?” Nico asked. “I almost can’t believe it’s actually happening. We were _sure_ that when we found the Ramman, the Pict would back down permanently. I just wish we knew _when_ they were coming.”

“You’re going to war,” England said after a moment. “With the _Pict?_ ”

Nico looked like he wanted to take back the last fifteen seconds of his life.

“That’s… not the one you’d heard about, was it?” he said.

“I was going to ask about the Tylwyth Teg,” Antonio said, somehow managing to continue sounding upbeat, _how._ “But this is good, too.”

“It’s not good _at all,_ ” Lovino heard France mutter.

“We don’t know exactly when or where or even for sure,” Nico said. “But they all pulled out right after Khares, and they’ve kept a trade schedule perfectly for _centuries,_ and now they’ve broken it. Right after Nia’s not around to enforce it any longer, and we don’t really have a way to get a new Jagdsprinz to replace her, and the Ramman still aren’t talking to anyone. We don’t have much of a plan- well, we’ve _got_ plans, but we don’t know how well they’ll work. That’s part of my job, and I haven’t had any good ideas. And then there’s evacuating. The one place we have to go is Honalee and we can’t fit _everyone_ there. It would be more of a problem, since we can’t close the Jagdshall connection, at least not without the Ramman’s help, but Switzerland taught us about the magical barrier he’d put around his land and Liechtenstein’s, so we’ll have that protection. The Pict couldn’t break it last time, and I bet they won’t be able to this time. We’ll probably pull you all back behind it, because we can’t lose you-”

A very strange expression crossed his face.

“Nico?” Lovino asked.

“I just had an idea,” he said. “I need to go talk to some people.”

* * *

Ahes was still getting used to the idea that there was a physical place she could go to speak to her mother. The last time she’d been around her, Nanshe hadn’t had a palace, and Theiostea might not even have formed yet.

But now, she could simply go to Theiostea, and knock on her mother’s door.

The last couple of times she’d tried this, nothing had happened. She hadn’t been expecting much different today- but this time, the door opened, and she found herself face-to-face, for the first time, with one of the robotic suits her younger siblings inhabited when not in their stars.

She was not going to be jealous. Just because they weren’t _trapped-_

The other star didn’t speak, just led her to the throne room. Ahes wasn’t sure if this was rudeness, or just how the Ramman did things. She didn’t like this feeling of not-knowing. The Ramman were her siblings, the other stars of the universe, and she felt as though she was supposed to find herself kin to them.

But she thought _‘my people’,_ and all she thought of was Kêr-Is how she remembered it, streets teeming with people and the squares full of shopping and discussion, declaimers, teachers, and idle thinkers all claiming their spaces. It seemed, from what she had found in her readings since arriving in this time, that everyone thought of Lanka Kubera as the hub of knowledge for Honalee, with it’s royal library and the many scholars and scribes dedicated to it.

When Kêr-Is had been sunk, and she declared a witch, it seemed as though Honalee had erased everything else about it and her from their collective memory. _Her_ city had been the hub of learning and experimentation and scholarship, a haven for all who wished a place, for the outcasts and the mismatched and those humans who had managed to flee-

Ahes was furious just thinking about it. _One day,_ one pronouncement that no one had been able to explain, so long ago, and everything she had been, everything she had stood for, everything of _her people-_ gone, overshadowed.

Her mother smiled when she saw her, from her throne at the end of the room. Ramman flanked the walls, shining of metal against the view of space beyond.

“Ahes,” Nanshe greeted her warmly. “Welcome home.”

 _This isn’t home,_ Ahes thought, and half-wished she hadn’t.

“It’s good to see you again, Mother,” she replied. “Why haven’t you been talking to anyone? The Kings are worried, and the humans especially so, about the Pict. They need you.”

Her mother’s expression went cold in an instant.

“They do not _deserve_ our help,” Nanshe said. “They killed you.”

“Gwyn ap Llud kills me,” Ahes corrected. “And _he’s_ dead, Mother. There’s no one alive now who had any hand in it.”

“Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor-”

“They’re saying she’s dead, too,” she told Nanshe. “But even if she wasn’t, or he wasn’t, you’re a King of Honalee, and the Ramman are needed to protect everyone against the Pict.”

“And why should I help them?” Nanshe demanded. “They did not help _you._ No one stood by _you,_ helped _you,_ defended _you._ ”

“That’s in the _past,_ Mother,” Ahes said. “Let it go.”

“I cannot!” her mother said. “You are my _daughter,_ Ahes, my first child!”

“Then do this for me,” Ahes asked. “I will be killed, and it will be unlawful, a disgrace- but I do not hold it against them all. It’s not their fault. You can’t hold everyone to blame.”

“ _Can’t_ I?” Nanshe asked archly. “I cannot lay just blame at the feet of those who would willingly follow bad leaders? I cannot condemn those of Erlkönig’s Hunt for killing you, nor those of Teufelmördor’s who is the cause of you being named witch, nor, even better, the Jagdsprinz itself, who has shown it cannot tell right from wrong? And yet those of Honalee and humanity persist in their cultish confidence in the Hunt’s flawlessness. It was declared an abomination by Ereshkigal herself-”

“Who the Jagdsprinz has named traitor and liar and derelict in duty!” Ahes exclaimed.

Nanshe went still, and her voice hard and flat.

“My _mother,_ ” she said. “Is no traitor, is not derelict in duty. This is _her_ universe, _her_ things, to do with as she wishes. She created the Jagdsprinz, she alone has the right to destroy it. She created the positions and institutions of the Kings, and those who defy them, and scorn her will, are at best disobedient children- though I find it more fitting to call _them_ the traitors, and worse, rebels bent on destroying what has been made, what _works,_ how things should be-”

“People have been hurt!” Ahes cut her off. “Souls have been _destroyed,_ Mother!”

“If _my_ mother did not see fit to keep them whole,” Nanshe said. “Then they were not fit, or that was their purpose to serve.”

“So _my people-_ ”

“Nothing has happened to your people.”

“Not the Ramman, Mother!” Ahes exclaimed. “ _My people. My city._ Kêr-Is. Ereshkigal decided that _they_ were not fit?”

“No,” Nanshe told her. “As I said- rebels bent on destruction. You are a King, and one of the stars, and you should have been untouchable.”

“The entire _point_ of the Jagdsprinz and the Hunt,” Ahes said. “Is that no one is untouchable, and that all wrongs are righted, as much as they can be.”

“And yet no one has tried to right the wrongs against you!” Nanshe half-yelled, rising a bit from her seat on her throne. The Ramman were still silent, and showed no reaction at all to the changing tone of the conversation. Could they speak at _all?_ “I was left to do so myself, to make one who could take your place and keep the order of the stars- and now she is gone! Vanished! The price I would have had in satisfaction from Teufelmördor is _gone,_ and so I must take something else!”

“Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor is _destroyed,_ Mother!” Ahes said. “There is nothing left to take! If there ever was a debt, it has been paid!”

 _“It has not!”_ Nanshe declared. “Those who would follow the Jagdsprinz, who turn against Ereshkigal- they are out of line, they are part of the degradation and the rot that allowed you to be _slaughtered,_ and I _will not_ suffer them a moment longer than I must! There is a chance at restitution, and I have taken it!”

“By refusing to speak to them?” Ahes asked. “By leaving them scared and uncertain? That is petty of you, Mother.”

“There is no uncertainty,” Nanshe said. “There will be no help from the Ramman, and you will never convince me otherwise. Three days after Ereshkigal finally destroyed the Jagdsprinz and the Hunt, I went to the Pict _personally_ and informed them that the Ramman have no allies. We are not of Honalee, Ahes, but Shar- we are Ereshkigal’s family, and we will have no dealings with those who do not. Honalee and humanity can perish in ruination of their own making, be it by Pict or the collapse of structures they founded in traitor rebel Kings who never deserved their power. Should it be by Pict- we are Ramman. We will win against them every time, and then we shall be rid of the small crawling constrained accidents clogging up the natural order of the universe that I made such a grievous mistake in patterning your form after.”

Ahes went from shocked to furious to appalled all in the space of a few seconds, one hot flash of emotion after the other.

“There is a _treaty-_ ”

“Which I never signed. They were against the Pict, _we_ were against the Pict. I only tolerated their presence as I have because Mayet came from my mother to speak for them. Shar and the Ramman had never before abided by the Jagdsprinz- and I was foolish in the past. They _knew,_ when they came, that Theiostea did not belong to them. The Pict told them so, and yet they came anyway. Pict and humanity are thieves fighting thieves; as Honalee is full of traitors and rebels and hypocrites who cry justice at every turn, but have never offered so much as a _scrap_ of sympathy for those unjustly taken, because they trust blindly and simply.”

“And what is following Ereshkigal, if not that?” Ahes shot back.

Her mother gave her a furious glare.

 _“The right thing to do,”_ Nanshe hissed. “She is our family, and our creator, and we owe her that loyalty!”

“Not if it has been _betrayed._ ”

“Lack of understanding on _their_ part,” Nanshe said. “Does not constitute _betrayal_ on my mother’s. If all you have come for is to press the case of those who would see you to your doom, I ask you to leave. Shar is always open to you as my daughter, and as one of the Ramman- but not as a messenger lackey of Honalee and the humans.”

“I’ll leave, then,” Ahes told her. “But so you know, _Nanshe-_ I am no Ramman. I won’t go so far as to renounce you, but I _cannot_ hold with you. I am a King of Honalee, my people are of Honalee and humanity, as are my friends, my _husband._ If the Ramman will not stand against the Pict, though you are so confident that they would always win- then we shall have to see what the _true_ power of a star is.”

* * *

Maria had never been in the Shining City for more than six hours at a time before. She’d snuck away nights a few times, which was why there had been a bed- but there was no food, no changes of clothes.

Looking back on it, Maria saw how the bed should have tipped her off. She hadn’t brought it here, it had just _been there_ when she’d wanted it. She’d mentioned coming nights a few times before to Kelsie, so she’d figured that they had just brought on it.

But now that she knew better- she’d made that. She hadn’t realized she had, but she had.

Kelsie had come to see her soon after she’d arrived with _Elti_ , and been very interested to finally see the Jagdsprinz. Maria had poured out the whole thing, Ereshkigal and breaking the Hunt and separate universes and all, and the only thing Kelsie had been surprised about was that she _hadn’t known._

“But that means I _made you,_ ” Maria had told them, sick to her stomach.

Kelsie shrugged, unconcerned.

“So?”

That was God’s work, or Sorcerer Héderváry’s. She’d almost resolved not to do any more magic, no more creating, but then she got hungry.

Making things was frighteningly easy. The trick was to not think about it- when she tried to be scientific about the food, she ended up with a pile of sludge that might or might not have been edible, she hadn’t tried it. But just thinking about wanting an apple, or some of the sugar-glass cookies the cooks made for special occasions- that would get her exactly what she wanted.

Clothes turned out to be just the same, as well. She could dress to the standards of Honalenier royalty in fully finery. It was better than _Mère_ ’s illusions, because this was _real._

For fun, though it wasn’t really fun at all, Maria tried suspending gravity. It worked, and she’d been so terrified that she’d thrown up everything she’d just eaten, and huddled up in a ball and shook for a little bit after. It wasn’t the shock of no gravity that had done it, but knowing she _could._

At least she was certain that she couldn’t be this free with things in the other universe. She would have realized by now if that was the case. It was because the Shining City was _hers_ that she could it.

The only thing that seemed outside her power was _Elti._ She’d tried and tried- if she was God here, then she should be able to resurrect people, right? But _Elti_ stayed gone, no heartbeat, no breathing, the Jagdsprinz still curled up on top of her, unresponsive.

Anywhere else, that would have been sure death, and Maria would have taken _Elti_ home and they could have had a funeral and things wouldn’t be _better,_ but they’d be… finished.

But _Elti_ wasn’t showing any other signs of being dead. She hadn’t gone into rigor mortis, she hadn’t started decomposing, and the not-knowing and the helplessness and the being entirely too powerful and not being able to go home and everything being just _awful_ drove her out to the edges of the Shining City with handfuls of stardust and her imagination, and she expanded the borders.

Nothing properly alive. Nothing sentient. No animals, no people. That was responsibility, in a way simply making more _things_ wasn’t. There were plenty of things that didn’t- hadn’t- actually existed, but now they did. There were floating mountains, rock structures in Escher geometry, lava you could stand next to and not die from the heat of, fields where it was always a _perfect_ sunny day. Geology and geography and meteorology meant nothing, not here.

The Shining City wasn’t exactly so shining any longer- she’d made plants, and added water features and colorful banners. It was still the prettiest place Maria had ever seen, but now it had bridges going off to other places.

She didn’t change the half-bridge to the edge of the universe, though. Maria always took a little time to leave off creating things to step outside the universe and have a look at how things were going back home.

They thought _Elti_ was dead, and _Mère_ was doing a lot of crying when no one else was around, and the exchange rate between the Honalenier Gold Standard and the Venetian lira and the Imperial Credit Unit was slowing destabilizing past the negligible deviations from the 1:1 ratio that had held for so long, and General Beilschmidt was really worried about the Imperial State and if she’d ever been inclined to join the Hunt, the only place to put her would have been in Intelligence and Internal Affairs, because there were no anti-spy measures that could catch her here.  

And everyone was trying to figure out how they’d survive the Pict. Or else they were trying to decide if and where the Pict would show up.

Maria could see anything from outside the universe. And she knew where the Pict homeworld was.

The Pict didn’t speak out loud amongst themselves- they were a single entity that could break into infinite new bodies, they didn’t _have_ any language but what they stole out of other people’s heads- but she could see the signs of consolidation easily enough. The Pict were pulling in, disgorging ships from the collective assimilation. She couldn’t be _sure,_ but she thought that there was a decision-making process going on about which ship would be the best for the Pict to take.

On October 26th, she went for her daily check-ins with the other universe after spending the morning and afternoon creating a stained-glass palace where the designs and pictures in the glass moved, always changing, to see the Pict take off from their homeworld.

She went back to the Shining City, pulled off her _Elti_ ’s AI interface, told Idunn what she’d seen, and dropped by the Jagdshall for a bare few seconds, just long enough to leave Idunn in _Elti_ ’s office, where she could get into the Hunt’s communication system and tell them that the Pict were coming, _now._

* * *

The meeting today had been hastily scheduled the night before, and wasn’t set to start until about ten. She’d made sure Feliciano was ready to leave right after breakfast, even if he didn’t have to go until nine. It was a short journey to Martigny from Venice.

Everything was out of the way for the next half-hour, exactly as she had planned it. There was a conversation that needed to happen before he left.

“Talk to Ludwig today,” Amphitrite told Feliciano. Her husband gave her the same terrified look he’d had all month, when she’d tried to bring the subject up, but she wasn’t going to let it drop this time.

“You know very well that he has taken the General back,” she said. “Cristoforo told us so. _Talk to him._ ”

“I don’t know what to say-”

“Tell him you’re sorry. Tell him you love him.”

“How am I supposed to-”

She was running out of patience for this.

“There are no good answers!” she snapped at him. “There is only explaining _what_ happened, and _how!_ After that it is a matter of continuing to talk, to giving space to emotions, to rebuilding trust and the relationship should that be your mutual choice! It is _work_ and it may often not be pleasant, but it is what must be done! Or shall you continue moping and wallowing in your personal emotional drama until a way is found to send them all home, and miss the _only_ chance you will ever have of fixing your relationship?”

“He’s going to hate me!” Feliciano burst out- and that was it, for her. They were having a full argument now, because she _refused_ to let this sit any longer. It had been _weeks._

“I have had no cause to say this before,” Amphitrite bit back. “And I _had_ doubted the stories I heard to the contrary- but you, Feliciano Costa, are a _coward_ and a _fool;_ and I will _drag_ you before your husband and _force_ you to apologize in person if that is what it takes, because he deserves to hear from you!”

“I hurt him!”

“You hurt _me,_ and yet, here we are!”

“I don’t deserve him!”

“You are _avoiding responsibility,_ Feliciano! If your daughter was still alive, for once I would _gladly_ let her at you so you would cease this incessant craven shirking! I am done coddling you!”

“When he tells me he doesn’t-”

 _“He loves you!”_ Amphitrite yelled at him. “Are you blind to what you have seen in front of your face? Are you deaf to what your own family has told you? _Ludwig Beilschmidt loves you,_ and he has been thinking away these days you have wasted worrying about _you!_ I have heard the truth of it for centuries and I saw it in Kharad and I have been told by people we _both_ trust, and who are in a position to know, that while he has kept mostly to himself it is clear that he has been thinking about _you!_ ”

“If he hasn’t said anything then how does anyone know!” Feliciano protested. “He _always_ sits on his thoughts and the longer he does the worse they are-”

“Emma Miccichelo has been available to them for three weeks and the only thing he has asked of her is how you have been, how you are doing, have you been well and happy and cared for- and yet you _insist_ on this _completely irrational conviction_ that he _hates you!_ ”

“You don’t know him like I do!”

“I’m beginning to think you don’t know him at all, or else you are too invested in your easy way out-”

 _“It’s not easy!”_ Feliciano screamed. They had to be frightening the government employees elsewhere in the building something awful- their usual arguments were really civil disagreements. _“It hurts!”_

“If you insist that he will hate you, then you have reason to never face him, because you have already decided that nothing can be fixed! You have decided that the extended pain of rebuilding your relationship, which will _end,_ is worse than spending the rest of forever weeping about your flaws in romantic angst!”

Feliciano glared at her tearfully, and turned his back to her.

“I’m not talking about Ludwig with you,” he declared.

“Now you’re just being petulant,” Amphitrite said. “Very well. Go to your meeting, Feliciano, and abandon your husband as you did me.”

* * *

The meeting between the three states was happening later today in one of the Jagdshall’s state rooms, but for now, Gilbert was at the Vatican, enjoying the sun. He and Cristoforo were out in the gardens, on a bench- Cristoforo seated, Gilbert lying down the length, with his head in the other man’s lap. Cristoforo was running his fingers through his hair, and Gilbert had already dozed off a bit, earlier. It was very relaxing, and strikingly intimate for them, and he wanted to savor every moment.

But pretty soon, he’d have to leave for Martigny, and he had no idea when he’d be coming back.

“I had a moment,” he told Cristoforo, eyes still closed. “When I went to see Ludwig. I didn’t want to say anything about it earlier.”

“Oh?” Cristoforo asked. “You told me about the other moment. This was not a good one?”

“Not so much,” Gilbert said. “I saw Ludwig, and- well it was a little before that. But I saw Ludwig, and he said that things were fine between us, and I realized that Dietrich isn’t enough. He hasn’t been enough, but I could fool myself. I’m not able to, anymore. Kit- Ivan’s right, I sold myself to Iran and it’s been a fine life, but I don’t- maybe Dietrich was worth it once, but it’s wearing me down. My job isn’t engaging anymore, and I’m not living for myself or anyone that matters enough to keep me- I’m _tired._ ”

Cristoforo stopped petting his hair, and Gilbert reached up blindly to catch his hand, and squeeze it.

“I’m going to be okay,” he promised. “So long as Ludwig’s here- I can live for him. But once he’s gone again- I don’t _want_ to die, Kit. I’m fighting it, and I’m going to keep fighting it, like I’ve always fought it. Anyway, I know now that if I die I’m stuck with Ereshkigal, and _fuck her._ Knowing that might be enough. But I don’t- I can’t be sure. I lost Lutz once already and Dietrich won’t cut it and the Imperial State isn’t going to cut it and when I lose him again-”

His voice had started breaking, and he was holding Cristoforo’s hand much too tightly. He made himself let go.

“I just- I’m sorry I’ve got such shit timing,” he said. “I _finally_ work up enough to actually do something again and the Church is relaxed enough that you can reciprocate in good consciousness and right away the galaxy starts falling to pieces and we might not even survive the month; and if we do I don’t know how long I’ll last after that. I just figured you should know. Before we go on anymore.”

“Gilbert,” Cristoforo said quietly. “I love you.”

He opened his eyes to look up at him.

“I love you too, Kit,” Gilbert told him. “Longer than anybody else. But we’ve both seen enough of how fucked up losing people makes everyone else, and I don’t want to do that to you. And I don’t want to break the family any more than it already is.”

Cristoforo started to trace the lines of his face, and Gilbert closed his eyes again, turning into it.

“I will not break,” he said. “I have God, and the Church, and my people. I will grieve you. And it will hurt, horribly. But I will not tear myself apart like Feliciano did, and I will not spin out of control and shatter as Lovino would have done, if Antonio had gone before him. We are not nearly as dependent on each other as our siblings and friends have been.”

“That’s good,” Gilbert said. “I needed to know that.”

It was an easy, fluid move for him- roll off the bench, knee on ground, hand into pocket-

“Marry me, then?” he asked.

Cristoforo stared at the ring he was offering.

“You don’t have to say yes,” Gilbert assured him. “I know the situation. You’ve never taken any vows and never really gone into orders, but if you feel like you can’t, I get it. We can keep going as we have. Just- take the ring, please? So you have it? It’s not any less of a promise from me because you feel like your position keeps you from accepting.”

“Gilbert,” Cristoforo said, lifting his eyes from the ring and reaching past the box, to cradle his face. “ _Gilbert._ At its heart, all a marriage is is an agreement that you are married, the acknowledgement of what God has already brought together. By that standard, we have been virtually married for a very, very long time already.”

The grin was as much relief as happiness.

“Yeah,” Gilbert said, doing his best not to look sheepish. He felt like he was probably failing, but did it _really_ matter? “Well, there’s the more official sort too, and I’d like that, if you could give it.”

Cristoforo closed his hands around the ring box, gently.

“I will think about it,” he said. “But even if I decide I cannot- we might as well be, Gilbert. Please do not forget that.”

“Never will,” Gilbert promised, and got off his knee enough to brace himself on the edge of the bench so he could lean forward and kiss him. “I’ve got a meeting to make, Kit. I’ll call you.”

* * *

There may have been worse spans of days in his life, but Ivan wasn’t certain. At the very least, the last two days and the morning in Khares were tied for the spot of worst times.

If it had just been Nanshe and the Ramman abandoning them, breaking both the implicit understanding of mutual help as a party who had accepted the Jagdsprinz’s authority and the explicit promises they’d made, that would have been one thing. They had been lucky that Nico had had his particular epiphany when he had, even if they weren’t totally certain if it would work or not.

But on the heels of that had come Idunn’s message from Maria about the imminent Pict, and now they were working on an estimated arrival timeframe that spanned from _‘right now’_ to _‘sometime before the end of the week’_.

The worst part of it was not knowing- both exactly when and where the Pict were coming, and about Nia.

Idunn hadn’t spread that around. She’d told only told Ivan and Lord Hiruz- by medical standards, Nia was dead; but take out the two details of no breath and no heartbeat, and it seemed more like a coma.

It hadn’t been _nice_ thinking that Nia was dead. But the vague hopeful indecision of it- dead or not?- was cruel, after that almost certainty. He’d prayed for her last night, and he was likely to do it again this night.

He almost wanted to tell Feliciano and the Gilbert, because more prayer was always better, but that would be- it wasn’t like they could go and see her. Better that they think her dead, if and until it could be proven otherwise.

The three of them assembled a bit early- Gilbert looking graver than Ivan had expected, and Feliciano with an odd stubborn set to his expression that was either an indication of having come from a fight, or trying not to cry.

There was no proper table in this room, just a couch and chairs around a coffee table, rearranged for the small group. Ivan locked the doors once the other two had gotten settled.

“So,” he said. “The Pict are coming.”

“I’ve been trying to get Forouzandeh to leave Helike, but she won’t do it,” Gilbert said. “I keep reminding her it will be basically front lines on the Pict, and she’s the government, but she keeps refusing. I gave _my_ people- the Intelligence ones, anyway- indefinite leave, and advised them to get as far out as they could. Into the Republican Confederacy if they felt safe doing that, or out to Docury. I know a couple of them decided to run for Honalee.”

“We need to speak,” Ivan told him, and smacked the report he’d gotten earlier that month down onto the coffee table.

Gilbert looked at it, then away, jaw clenching.

 _“The Pict are coming,”_ Ivan stressed. “This is no time for political games.”

“It’s not a game,” Gilbert said. “I was _trying_ to tell you, without telling you. National security secrets.”

“There is no _security_ if there is no _state._ ”

“That’s the problem,” Gilbert said. “I can pull the military for the Pict. I’m _going_ to, there’s no choice. But I’m not sure the Imperial State will survive it.”

Ivan blinked at him, glanced down at the report, swiftly drew conclusions from the otherwise-innocuous information about distribution.

“The police _is_ the military,” he said.

“We’re not set up for this,” Gilbert told them. “If there’s a war, which there’s not _supposed_ to be, the assumption was that the Hunt is there to stop the war before it really gets going; and if that doesn’t work, be the police while we’re gone. We’re also designed for slower deployment- pull a little experience, mix it in with new volunteers and trainees, keep going until you get even distribution and the numbers you need. It’s a _good_ system for the times we lived. But there’s no Jagdsprinz-”

“We cannot stop this war,” Ivan said, following the logic trail. “You must pull out fast, and the Hunt is going along, such as we are now. If it were only the Hunt to leave, you would be fine- we could even manage if _you_ pulled all your people, and we had Nia to act as authority backing Jäger stretched thin. It would be more difficult than the first, but manageable. But we are _both_ leaving, because if we still had a Jagdsprinz, we would not be in this situation.”

“Our only hope is to get them before they can land anywhere,” Gilbert said. “So we need everybody on ships. Once the Pict make planetside- may as well give it all up. We won’t get them off unless they _want_ to leave. So I need _all_ my people to crew. The Hunt will still have ground forces-”

“Not where you think,” Ivan told him. “Nico has had a particular plan that _may_ work, and an aspect of it requires a clean planet. That, and general civilian safety, will occupy all our Regiments Jäger who are not cross-trained to naval positions. We will evacuate as many as we can, for as long as we can.”

“Where are you going to put them all?” Feliciano asked.

“Aphwhion is in Republican space, but still mostly empty,” Ivan said. “We have been assured we can send many there. And there are few planets who do not have room for new settlers, if evacuees cannot go back.”

“The Imperial State can’t guarantee their safety,” Gilbert said. “Even if, some miracle, things manage to stand through being almost totally stripped of law enforcement and gutting part of the judiciary, a load of refugees would be enough to destabilize things into collapse.”

“Venice’s holdings are all close to the Pict,” Feliciano said.

“There _will_ be room,” Ivan told them. “It will be found, or made; but we will _not_ leave to the Pict any we can protect.”

He was certain the other two agreed with him, at heart; but logistics and practicality were dampening their belief that it could be done.

“So what’s this idea Nico’s had?” Gilbert asked, changing the subject.

“We know how Switzerland created his barrier that held against the Pict,” Ivan said. “It is better when they are deep-set and settled, as his is, but they can be thrown up quickly. It is an untested construction, but it is our best hope. The only prohibitive factor is power. It requires a King, or a Seelenkind.”

“Then we’re shit out of-”

“Nations are lacking only consciously-accessible power,” Ivan cut him off. “Not position. It is as though Ereshkigal had made the entire universe a demon house, and so we are merely _cut off._ Nico has been speaking to Luisa and János, and János brought Edward, and Vasco and Terenzia. Calculations have been made. The spell set, and powered by the death of a Nation-”

“Hold the _fuck_ up,” Gilbert said. “No. _No._ ”

Ivan shot him a disgruntled look.

“It is no _true_ death,” he said. “When the Jagdsprinz returns, so return Nations.”

“ _Is_ the Jagdsprinz coming back, though?” Feliciano asked.

 _“When the Jagdsprinz returns,”_ Ivan insisted, because with this plan, he was not going to accept any other options. “The Nations whose deaths gave the power for the barriers return to life, and once the Pict have been dealt with, they can drop the barriers.”

“That’s a shit plan,” Gilbert insisted.

“It is no worse than yours,” Ivan shot back. “So you propose to shoot at them until they die? We know very well that they can take inanimate objects as well- what if they take a ship? It would be a simple thing, then, to just follow the lightspeed lanes to each planet.”

“We turn the beacons off,” Gilbert answered. “There’s an emergency message in place for that already. It’ll buy everyone else a little time, at least. I’ve got no idea how fast Pict ships can go outside of their own space, but given what little we know about the time frame for them destroying all the other life in the universe but Earth- I’m guessing not very fast. It might take _years._ And if the planets on the lightspeed lanes shut down their end of the gates from the Ramman, then that’s even more travel time.”

“That will definitely destroy the Imperial State.”

“I’d rather keep everyone _alive,_ than politically cohesive!”

“Ivan,” Feliciano said. “Gilbert’s right about the ships. I assume the Hunt’s fleet is coming?”

“The more guns the better, yes?”

“But you’ve got those flicker drives on yours,” Feliciano reminded him. “They don’t _need_ lightspeed lanes. If the Pict get one, then they have an in to Honalee, and none of this matters.”

“If you’re coming, that has to be part of the tactics,” Gilbert said. “If the Pict start taking ships, then you’re _out._ ”

“Of _course_ we are coming,” Ivan insisted, and settled in for a long argument. “Magic is the only thing we have proof that is completely effective against the Pict. We may not have the Jagdsprinz, but the Hunt is still the best for magical warfare.”

* * *

“I just wish we could _test_ it,” Nico fretted, looking at the final plans strewn around the Workshop’s floor.

“It works against Arik,” János said. “That’s the best you’ll get.”

The others who had been working on the project had gone off to take a late lunch and wait for final assignments. The fleets were assembling tomorrow. Nico hadn’t gone to lunch because his stomach was too twisted up to care about food, and didn’t need the distraction before getting assignments. He already knew he was going to be part of the ground force on Oskapus. Leberecht had agreed to serve as the Nation behind the barrier trap they were planning for the Pict there, and Nico wasn’t sure when the rest of Nia’s children were going to start talking to him again, for accepting his help. Isolde had been snubbing him for the past three days, so it was probably better that he hide out in the Workshop for as long as possible, actually.

Anyway. He wanted to talk to János.

“So,” Nico said, trying to come up with a polite way to frame the question. “I know you were drunk-”

“I wasn’t _that_ drunk,” János told him; and good, if he already knew what Nico was talking about, that kept him from having to ask the question _‘Are you really planning on murdering Ereshkigal?’_ , because that would have been a very awkward thing to do. “I’m not sure I’m stuck with kinright for Nia, really-”

Oh, well, good?

“-but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t do anything.”

Not good?

“She destroyed Nia,” János said, starting to list off on his fingers. “She let a lot of awful things happen in Honalee. She’s at least partially responsible for my father, and Nia’s father too. She banished the Jagdsprinz, which got us into this situation- and _she has our parents._ ”

Those were some pretty good reasons to do something, but still.

“What _can_ we do about it?” Nico asked. “She’s not letting anyone past Mayet.”

“I don’t think it’s a _‘we’_ thing, Nico,” János told him. “The Hunt’s about to get busy with the Pict, and they need you. But _I’m_ not essential.”

Nico got chills down his spine.

“You _can’t_ go by yourself,” he said. “Take somebody else- wait until we’re done with the Pict!”

“Can’t,” János said. “The whole point of this plan is that if we get the Jagdsprinz back, we can do something about the Pict, right? Well, I’ve talked to Sebastian. Maria got the Jagdsprinz back last time, and we know from Idunn that she’s with it now and that she’s been watching what’s going on here. So the way I figure it, the only thing keeping the Jagdsprinz from having Maria help it back and picking a new, uh, Jagdsprinz, is Ereshkigal. She’ll never agree to let it back, so _she_ has to go. And the sooner the better.”

“Take somebody else with you!” Nico insisted.

“Who?” János asked. “You’re going to Oskapus. The only other available _Seelenkind_ are Reno and Nadri and Sebastian; and they’re _children._ I could take a King, but Amphitrite and Ahes are the only ones who would come. Amphitrite needs to be there to rule her Kingdom, and if Ahes was forbidden from going along with the fleet because she _has_ to be safe, I can’t take her against Ereshkigal.”

“Ereshkigal won’t want to end the universe by killing her and destroying the timeline,” Nico said, but it didn’t sound very true to his ears. János was right about her being safe- Ahes had helped with the planning of the trap, and had asked a lot of probing questions of him, like _‘how do you calculate magic, this is how I’ve always done it?’_ and _‘just how much magic can a Seelenkind bring to bear?’_ and _‘if destroy things, how thoroughly can you do it?’_.

She’d been very helpful, and very upset about not being allowed to help further.

“I’m going by myself,” János told him. “If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work, and I’m gone and she doesn’t have an excuse to come after the rest of the Hunt for it, or anyone else.”

That was an unfortunately good point.

“So you’ve got a plan, then?”

The other man made a noncommittal sound. Nico interpreted this to mean _‘I’m relying on raw power and whatever I can come up with in the moment’_.

“Árpád will never forgive me if Ereshkigal gets you,” he said, a doubtful thought niggling at the back of his mind.

_You never would have done something like this if Lana was alive._

“If this works the way I want it to,” János told him. “I doubt she’ll see me coming.”

* * *

Lunch had been had.

The four of them had very carefully ignored the beeps from their two-ways that meant they’d received their assignments until all the food was gone, but now they couldn’t put it off any longer.

Luisa read hers first.

“I’m staying here,” she said. “The Workshop has been deemed _‘strategically indispensable’_ , so I have to be around to run it.”

“Good choice,” Árpád agreed, and Terenzia clenched the fabric of her pants in her fists as they opened their orders.

They noticed her worry, and gave her a quick, small smile before reading.

“I’m staying as well,” they said. “It says that everyone from High Command is-”

Árpád cut themself off suddenly, and Terenzia’s heart sped up.

“What?” she demanded.

“General Adimari is going with the fleet,” Árpád told her.

“He basically has to,” Terenzia said. “That’s not it. _What,_ Árpád?”

“Your father,” they said reluctantly. “It says that General Adimari is in command of the fleet, and your father is in command of the ground forces on Oskapus. For the trap.”

Terenzia met her brother’s eyes, and he looked just as scared as she felt about that.

“He’s going to be right in the middle of everything!” Vasco protested. “If something goes wrong, we’re going to- we won’t see him again!”

She didn’t want to think about that, so she opened her orders instead.

And stopped breathing.

“Terenzia? _Terenzia?_ ”

“Vasco,” she managed to say, voice shaking. She felt Árpád put an arm around her and try to lean over so they could read her orders. She hid them. “Open- open your orders.”

She knew when he did, because he inhaled sharply.

“You-” her brother started to say, and then stopped.

“Vasco?” Edward asked. He sounded scared.

“Yes,” Terenzia answered her brother. “Me too. We’re all going to Oskapus."

A pause.

" _Mama_ is going to be so upset.”

* * *

On October 30th, as the various militaries were assembling out in space, the time-traveled Nations and their children were moved from Prarayer to the Jagdshall, so they would be within the protection of Switzerland’s old barrier, should it be needed.

Gilbert had come by to see him again yesterday, and told him that he was going off to the war. It hadn’t been a very long talk, because his brother had had a lot of things to get done in a very short period of time, and Ludwig hadn’t wanted him to go.

His brother had looked at him sadly, and told him: “I’m the General, Lutz. This is my job.”

_I don’t want you to go, I can’t lose you, you’re the last thing I have, you’ve always been there if you die I won’t have anyone I won’t know what to do-_

Ludwig hadn’t said any of it, because it was all tangled up in _Nia_ and _Feliciano_ and _I have less than a year to live,_ and he’d been trying to sort it out but it was too much to just keep in his head. It was something that needed to be talked out, but he always talked to Feliciano about this.

And Feliciano hadn’t come to see him.

He’d thought about asking Leutnant Miccichelo for contact information, but- Feli was married, to someone else. His and Feliciano’s marriage had probably made a big mess with Amphitrite, no matter how she had treated him in Kharad, and his sudden reappearance was probably making things difficult. Jealousy happened, and fear.

Ludwig knew. He’d been living some of it for the past month.

But if it was easier for Feli to not come see him, that was- it _would be_ fine.

Ludwig just wished he knew for sure. He _knew_ that Feliciano loved him, but maybe-

What if-

Feliciano could love Amphitrite more than him. It wasn’t impossible. It was almost _likely,_ since they’d been together a lot longer than he and Feliciano had been. Ludwig had tried not to think about it, but once he’d realized this was a possibility, he hadn’t been able to banish the idea.

He was trying very hard to find something to positive about- it was hard, despite what they’d been told earlier in the month they’d been put up in the safe room again and it was making the other Nations very tense- when Feliciano finally, _finally_ showed up.

She smiled nervously at their children and hugged them tightly. When Zell asked what was wrong, the answer was “War.”

It was true, but he didn’t think that was all of it.

She gently pushed Zell and Heinrich away, and just barely managed to meet his eyes.

“Ludwig-”

Feliciano didn’t have to say anything for him to know what she was going to ask. It was what he wanted, too- some privacy. He took her hand, and tried to ignore the way his heart skipped at the badly-missed contact, and took them out into the hallway, shutting the door behind them.

“Feli-”

She yanked her hand out of his.

He was not hurt, he _was not,_ if she didn’t want to touch him then she didn’t want to touch him.

“I just,” she said. “I need to- the thing is with this plan- it’s the only one we have but it needs the Nation- I won’t be- I can’t- they’re really strong and I don’t think we can stop them and so I had to-”

“ _Spatzi,_ ” he interrupted her. “You’re not making any sense.”

The look Feliciano gave him was one of absolute misery.

“I love you I’ve always loved you I really really messed up with everything I’m so sorry I had to say it I have to go I have to be in Venice if the Pict come you’ll never see me again,” she blurted, and turned on her heel to make for the stairs.

 For one horrible instant, he could imagine the same scene through wrought-iron gates on a snowy December morning.

Ludwig snatched her wrist and yanked her back around. The words came up from some part of the emotional morass, unthought before he said them but sounding so right once he did.

_“Stop **running away!** ”_

Feliciano froze, staring at him wide-eyed. His gut response was still immediate guilt, _stop you’re scaring her hurting people is bad,_ but-

“That’s _all_ you’re ever doing!” Ludwig told her, and to his ears it sounded something like pleading but inside it felt like heartbreak. “Is that all this has ever been? You were running away when I met you! You kept coming back because you were running away! You were running away from the war, you were running away from your problems at home- Goddamnit all, Feliciano-”

There were tears burning behind his eyes and he felt like shaking himself apart from the inside out, _why-_

“-I fell in love with you because you could be happy, because you could _ignore_ how much everything hurt, you were running away and I just didn’t realize- after the war you told me I could be better if I faced it and learned and I’d thought you’d stopped running-”

Was he _angry?_ Some of this felt like anger, a sort of betrayal at the hypocrisy of the person he’d built his stability on, when he’d destroyed everything else.

Feliciano was the one thing that was never supposed to leave.

“-but you were always running even when no one else knew! You were running away from the memory of Heinrich Adler and you were running away from trying to maintain your marriage with Amphitrite and you were running away from what you did to the rest of Italy and you were running away from the demon and you ran away from _me,_ Feli!- first when we became Nations again and second in the House that December and I don’t even know how many times it happened, it’s going to happen, between that Christmas and the day I die that I try to talk to you and you don’t let me but then all _this_ happened and you did it _again,_ you pushed me away and this is the first time I’ve seen you in _weeks_ and **_Nia_** _is **gone**_ but I haven’t heard a _thing_ from you until today, and it’s a _goodbye **again!**_ ”

“Ludwig, I really do have to-”

“Stop,” he told her, tired now that he’d found the words, and done with this conversation. Emotions were hard. “You love me, Feli, I don’t doubt that. And I love you. But- Gilbert needs me. Nia needed me. You don’t need me. I love you and you love me; but I need you and you _don’t_ need me. You can live without me. I can’t. I don’t know how. Gilbert and Nia managed- Gilbert had done it before, he had Dietrich to try again with. Nia tied herself up in duty so she had something, so she could be needed, I’ve been hearing about how nothing can work right without her ever since we got here. That’s what I would have done. If I lost you- I don’t know what it would be, Feliciano, probably the government, but I’d sink myself into it because I _need something,_ and I wouldn’t recognize myself when I came out.”

Feliciano still looked scared, but he had a clear enough head to recognize that she wasn’t scared _of_ him, but _for_ him.

“Ludwig-”

“That’s _exactly_ what Gilbert and Nia did,” he realized, the knowledge not even registering until he said it. More parts of the morass fell apart, coming to order. “Gilbert sank himself into the German Lands, and then into the Imperial State, into the military and the spies. Nia kept giving more and more of herself to the Hunt. The General and the Jagdsprinz- who even calls them by their names any longer? Gilbert had done it before so much that he knew how to keep himself, but Nia- I don’t know who she was, because she _didn’t,_ she-”

Off topic.

“But you did better than that,” Ludwig told Feliciano, mentally shaking himself. “You walked right away from everything. You _can_ stop, Feli, you can just _walk away_ from people. I can’t do that. _We_ can’t do that. We’ll break.”

“You broke down once,” Feliciano said. “It was over a _war,_ Ludwig, you won’t over-”

“No,” he cut her off. “I did. That was the same thing. I couldn’t make myself be just Germany and have the government be it for me, but I _couldn’t_ without that. But you were there. You were helping, and no one else was. You told me I could be better. Feliciano-”

Had they never actually talked about this? He’d thought they had. He was sure he’d said how much Feliciano had meant to him before, but maybe- she just hadn’t heard what he’d meant.

“I’d do bad things for you, _Spatzi_ ,” he confessed quietly. “Wrong things. Not- not _anything._ There are things I’ll never do, not again. But a lot of things. I wouldn’t do them if you asked me to and I wouldn’t do them if I could think of another way- but I would. After I’d thought about it. But you wouldn’t. Not because you don’t love me as much, but because you love me _differently_ \- and you’d have run away long before then, and dragged me along. I’m not sure either of those is a better way to live, but _Spatzi_ , that’s how we are, and _I need you to stay._ ”

“I have to go,” she said a third time, desperately- and he _couldn’t._ He just couldn’t. She’d said she wasn’t going to see him again and _needed her,_ she wasn’t listening but she was _everything;_ and what she wanted-

Ludwig let go.

Feliciano left.

* * *

General Marco Adimari was in charge of the Hunt’s shipyards on Uaclleon, and this post had translated into being General of the Hunt’s fleet as well. It also folded the _Groβjagdsreich_ ’s navy under his command as well, though their numbers were more of a legal fiction than anything. The _Groβjagdsreich_ had little need for a standing military, what with the general peace of the galaxy and the expense of maintaining the Hunt- a sort of army all on its own- so the _Groβjagdsreich_ part of the navy was really ships that civilian crews under a Jäger officer. The carracks, the Hunt’s smallest ships at only two or three crew, were crewed entirely by Jäger.

No one had any idea where the Pict were going to show, but it had seemed a reasonable hope that massing the bulk of the joint navies in one place would attract the Pict there, which would give the militaries a chance to spring the planned trap on Oskapus, which had been evacuated for the attempt. The only people now on the surface were _Razanás_ Oskapus himself, a good number of the Hunt’s sorcerers, and a handful of Venetian and Imperial military mages.

“General Nicodemo Agresta, reporting in position on Oskapus,” came the voice over the fleet band. This particular one had been expanded and designated specifically for the joint operation against the Pict, and every ship in all three fleets was tuned into it. “Mark Zero.”

That was the start of the check-in.

“General Marco Adimari, _RSR Zürich_ , reporting flagship and fleet in position,” he said. “Mark One.”

There was a pause before the next in line.

“Admiral Fedele Gheri, _ANV Vittorio Veneto,_ reporting flagship and fleet in position. Mark Two.”

“General Gilbert Beilschmidt, _ISS Mars,_ reporting flagship and fleet in position,” broadcast promptly, right on the heels of the last check-in. “Mark Three.”

The delay in the last part of the check-in wasn’t due to inattention, but the adjustment of equipment to eliminate planetside lag.

“General Floris Kappel for Marschall Braginski, Jagdshall hears you loud and clear. Mark Four. Three-”

A pulse tone over the band.

“Two-”

Another pulse tone. Marco got ready to send his.

“One-”

He hit the key to broadcast his test tone.

“Zero.”

And the last tone. The communications band was set and divided out through the Hunt’s hastily-expanded switchboard, which now matched that of the fleets’ flagships. The Jagdshall, _RSR Zürich_ , _ANV Vittorio Veneto_ , and _ISS Mars_ would be able to parse out communication by position and fleet for every ship, for best coordination and strategy. The sorcerers and military mages on Oskapus weren’t as connected, but the Jagdshall was picking up their transmissions. They were ground forces, and didn’t _need_ to know what the fleets were doing above their heads.

That was the test done for what they were hoping would be the main theater of fighting. Brioclite was abandoned for the time being, and Theiostea was too thickly settled to be evacuated, so most of the rest of the Imperial and Venetian fleets were divided between Oxqyama, Jelea, and Trojana- partially there to fight, and partially to oversee the Hunt’s ongoing evacuations of the planets, as least as much was feasible. Oxqyama had the most, since they would have to cover for Helike until the rest of the fleets got there.

The Hunt only had one dreadnought- the biggest and most heavily-armed and -armored of the spacefaring vessels- which were invariably the flagships. Marco was on it, but the cruiser _RSR Bedisa_ was serving as the head of the small Hunt cohort keeping watch Theiostea, Brioclite, and the area between it for incursions. The hope was that the presence of the Ramman in the area would keep the Pict from venturing there, no matter if _Razanás_ Nanshe had declared them neutral or not. Marco spared the moment for a prayer that _Bedisa_ and her cohort would find nothing.

One of the other Hunt cruisers, _RSR Eraint ap Enaid,_ was with the Oxqyama group, and started their check-in.

“Generalleutnant Enar Jak, _RSR Eraint ap Enaid,_ reporting in position. Mark Five.”

“Captain Alessandra Ricci, _ANV Lepanto,_ reporting in position. Mark Six.”

“Captain Ora Adolfini, _ANV Settepozi,_ reporting in position. Mark Seven.”

“Captain Ichi Telekea, _ISS Saturn,_ reporting in position. Mark Eight.”

Then it was to Jelea.

“Generalleutnant Cohen Ulleno, _RSR Vahan,_ reporting in position. Mark Nine.”

“Captain John Raymond, _ISS Mercury-_ ”

It was up on _Zürich_ ’s instruments just as Marco was able to pick it out from the star field. He found himself mysteriously calm, with an odd tight fluttery-ness right around his heart area. He keyed into the band, overriding the Jelea check-in.

“ _Zürich_ to all Marks. _Zürich_ to all Marks,” he broadcast to the entire military force. “Visual and instrument confirmation on unknown ship in Oskapus, from Pict Dominion Space heading.”

The hailing call was standard procedure, he didn’t even have to do that himself. One of the bridge crew had sent it out as soon as the instruments had reported.

They knew the call was received, because they didn’t get silence in return. There were no words, but there was an awful, angry cacophony of screeching hissy _noise_ that was either cut off at the source, or the crew had muted.

Just one ship, as far as they could see, and surprisingly close- but Marco looked at the instruments, and it was still far out, past the edges of the group here. It was just that big.

Judging by experience and an eyeball estimate against other objects, he’d have to say that this craft was bigger than even the massive colony ships of centuries ago, which _had_ been the biggest spacefaring craft humanity had ever made. Not the biggest thing they’d ever put there- but the biggest ones that were supposed to _move._

But really, they didn’t need the size or the non-reply reply to know. The ship’s heading and unexpected arrival had done that.

“Pict closing to engagement distance,” Marco told the forces. “ _Zürich_ readying weapons, advising _Veneto_ and _Mars_ to follow suit. All Marks, stand alert. Zero, One, Two, Three- prepare for hostilities.”


	13. Jericho

“Your Highness, they won’t move Helike.”

_A plague of nightmares on Forouzandeh Qazai!_ Odette silently cursed. She waved her secretary off, and looked around the table.

It was a small emergency meeting at the _d’Etat_ offices- Martinach’s _Président d’Etat,_ Nia’s Chief of Staff, the _Groβjagdsreich_ ’s PR Director, and herself- convened as soon as news had come that the Pict had been spotted by the fleets, to handle last-minute details.

The _Président_ shifted uncomfortably.

“I don’t like this plan,” he said again.

“I know,” Odette told him. “But we have to do it. If the Pict get this far, this has to be as far as they go.”

“We’re going to be cutting off the rest of the _Groβjagdsreich_!” the Chief of Staff protested. This wasn’t a new point, or a new argument. She’d been hearing variations of it since Nico had finished hammering out the details of the idea he’d had. “We’re abandoning our people!”

“We’ve got a duty to the people _here,_ Shianna,” Odette stressed. “And to Honalee, under the Tripartite Treaty. We _have_ to raise the old barriers, because they’re the only thing we _know_ will hold off the Pict.”

“We don’t grow our own food here, we’re going to starve-”

“We’ll trade for it from Honalee.”

“That’s expensive!” Shianna exclaimed. “And how are we supposed to keep up our standards of living and our economy? Every part of the _Groβjagdsreich_ supports every other part, with the internal flow of goods balancing out resources throughout-”

“I _know,_ Shianana!” Odette cut her off. “But it’s a choice between _surviving_ and letting the Pict take _everything!_ ”

“I know that too! I’m just pointing out it’s going to be a very hard transition-”

“And how am I supposed to sell it?” the PR Director wanted to know. “ _‘Betrayal’_ is hard word to get rid of.”

“ _‘We are protecting the people who we can protect’_ ,” Odette quoted off ideas she’d been writing down as they came to her, and handed the paper over. “Start there, come up with something.”

“Second problem,” the Director continued. “My staff came up with sample press questions, and the only one I don’t know how to address is _‘Is the government not worried that we’ll be locking ourselves in with Ereshkigal-’_ ”

“That’s a question for the Hunt-” Odette started to tell him.

“The Hunt hasn’t spoken to anyone in almost a month-”

“It’s not our job-”

“All due respect, _Your Highness,_ ” the PR Director snapped. “But if the Emperor was alive it wouldn’t _matter_ who’s job it was!”

“The Jagdsprinz is alive,” Odette said, automatically. She’d thought over the scenario of press making a comment about Nia being dead so often that she’d even started correcting her own thoughts on the matter.

“People aren’t _stupid,_ Your Highness,” the Director said, sounding a little apologetic for bringing up the taboo topic. “The Pict are attacking. Stonewalling the press isn’t fooling anyone. It’s time to stop.”

The room went quiet, waiting for the response. Odette looked down at her papers- all the preparation she’d done for this meeting, a week’s worth of ideas and contingencies and panicked scribblings, and wondered what the _point_ was.

“Draft me a statement of death,” she told the PR Director, because the man was right. No one was fooled, and Nia wasn’t coming back. It was time to stop pretending she would. “Make it sound like we meant to wait this long. Say something about the balance of probabilities.”

“Isn’t it unusually long?” the _Président_ asked. “Given the circumstances-”

“She’s- she _was_ a King of Honalee, and _Seelenkind_ ,” Odette said. “It’s not unreasonable.”

Odette’s secretary cleared his throat quietly. Everyone looked at him, surprised that he hadn’t left yet.

“Your Highness,” he said. “I’m also supposed to inform you that the Pope told _Razanás Vaticanae_ to come and stay in Martinach, just in case. So that the Church could be preserved. He’s probably arriving at Sankt Michelmarc’s now.”

“As long as we know where he is,” Odette told him, surprised that the Vatican had agreed to leave his city. “ _Now_ you can-”

“Wait,” the _Président_ interrupted. “If the Empress isn’t leaving Helike, the Imperial State should have a government seat set further back from the Pict, in case they take a long time to get anywhere now that they’ve left their own space. So, if Helike falls- who’s in charge of Humanity Imperial?”

* * *

“Your fiancée is a hero, and anyone saying otherwise is an idiot and a fool,” Cazia Hengda told her son. She’d come to see him for his lunch break, and Hengda had walked her back to her hotel in the time he had left. They were lingering in the lobby. “The Hunt isn’t here and, honestly, I would almost be surprised if they _did_ come back. Bring her back on duty. The NCO Auxiliaries are all that’s left of the Hunt at the moment, she’s needed.”

“Freiezuno is one of the Independent Powers, Mother,” Hengda said. “We’ve kept our police, and no one has a great need for the Hunt here right now.”

“But Imperials are flooding into your ports and people are panicking; which can be alleviated by people feeling that _someone_ has a handle on things, preferably someone they trust,” she reminded him. “Your husband _made_ you take this break, I’ll have you remember.”

She waved him towards the doors.

“If you’re going to do the riot lines, call me,” she told him. “Go, I have a meeting and you’ll have work, now that the Pict have been sighted.”

Hengda left, quickly, and Cazia told herself that she _would_ see her son again. The fleets would take care of the Pict.

Her son had probably thought that her meeting was long-distance, with the people still in Helike; but everyone she needed to see was right here.

She counted heads as she came in- Artakshathra, flickering just a bit with an AI’s equivalent of being too nervous to concentrate; Antoine Kalananka, holding on to his composure with his fingernails because he was convinced that with the Empress refusing to leave Helike and the General with the fleets _he_ had to be in charge; and what members of the Imperial Senate had been worried enough to leave Helike but too scared to go home, instead following her to a planet on the edge of the Republican Confederacy that wasn’t even part of their own state.

Oh, and Deliah Habicht-Misra, wife of Abel Habicht-Misra, who had legally switched to his wife’s surname to remove himself from the disgraced Honda-Brynjarssons; and Augustin Gebar.

Perfect. The majority of the room was too scared to make much protest, Artakshathra and Kalananka were nervous and worried and could fall apart at the first sign of bad news, and Deliah and Augustin weren’t even citizens of the Imperial State.

“What are we doing here?” one of the particularly scared-looking Senators asked.

_“We,”_ Cazia Liukasiewicz told him, taking her seat at the head of the table with a confident sweep of her skirts. “Are here to discuss the future of Humanity Imperial.”

“Do we _have_ a future?” someone else asked.

“The Pict have been defeated- and thwarted- before,” Cazia said. “The Hunt has a plan, and I am certain that they _will_ succeed.”

A degree of relaxation rippled down the table.

“So,” a Senator asked hopefully. “You know when they’re going to bring the Jagdsprinz out-”

Augustin snorted in derision, and Cazia eyed him. She wasn’t surprised that he’d approached her to ask why so many high-ranking Imperial officials were suddenly in Kharad- he’d pulled a surprising about-face and become a staunch supporter of Ravenna Saab, now Governor of Freiezuno, and had pulled off the political coup of being appointed Deputy Governor for it- but she still hadn’t figured out why he’d pushed to be included in, as he’d put it, _‘whatever you think is so important to do while we’ll all staring total destruction in the face’_.

“Please, she’s dead,” he said. “Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor wouldn’t have let things get to this point if she was in any way capable of preventing it. This isn’t some grand ruse or plan, no matter _what_ the media drivel you’ve been listening to has said.”

“But without the Jagdsprinz-”

“Hunt High Command isn’t full of _idiots,_ ” Augustin cut in, before Cazia could. “They’re perfectly capable of doing things without her.”

“They have all the experience of an old Nation,” Cazia added, trying to figure out where Augustin’s confidence in and support of the Hunt had come from. He’d always been so outspoken about _‘foreign influences’_ in Freiezuno, so what had changed since Béutros Saab?

Maybe it was that the demon Belial would never have been put down without the Hunt’s _‘foreign intervention’_. She didn’t think that could be all of it, though, and resolved to puzzle it out later.

“More, even,” she continued. “Given Marschall Lord Hiruz and the others left from Erlkönig’s Hunt. But-”

Cazia looked around the table, making certain she had everyone’s undivided attention.

“-to business. This crisis will pass, and then we will be in another one. We have all heard the questions raised about Nations’ legal status, given the situation with the Jagdsprinz, but now it has taken on a new dimension. I am… _concerned-_ ”

Which was a nice, almost-neutral word. It had good connotations of selflessness and caring and even, somehow, emotional and moral honesty and uprightness.

“-that Empress Forouzandeh’s response to this crisis shows that her judgement has been impaired by her sudden change of status.”

A quiet uproar happened in the room. Cazia raised her hand sharply for silence, and got it.

The benefits of being Head of the Senate, and holding so much real power and authority in the Imperial government outside of what her job description technically detailed.

“We have long known from our own Nations that their elders can be… ill-advised, where power is concerned. Therefore, I propose that we convice the Empress, once this crisis is past, to name an heir, to be trained in the same way that Deputy Governors-”

A nod to Augustin Gebar.

“-are trained.”

“But-” several Senators tried to say at once.

_“And,”_ Cazia pressed. “We must remember that, without a Jagdsprinz, Nations are _mortal._ In fifty or seventy years, we would be without an Empress, and with no one trained to take her place.”

Heads started to turn towards Artakshathra. His avatar hologram blinked out of existence from an overload of nerves. Wonderful- the beginning of a bad showing on the part of established power meant a vacuum, and she was more than ready to step up if they’d finally hit their breaking point. She’d been preparing all month against the possibility that things would fall apart.

“Any replacement would have help, certainly,” Cazia said smoothly, as though a question had been asked. The good thing about pretending was that you could invent the question. Steering the conversation was never something to be taken lightly. “But there is something to be said for physical presence, don’t you think?”

Rude? Yes.

Good for her politics? Yes.

_Politics wins over manners, every time._

“But who _could?_ ” Kalananka asked. “I’ve been working for her for decades, and I couldn’t possibly replace her. No one could.”

Immediately, no one could. He was right about that, but Cazia was still thrilled he’d said what he had. He’d just taken himself out of the running for the Empress’s successor. He wouldn’t have been a _bad_ choice, but there was such a thing as being too loyal to a passing regime, and too attached to the old way of doing things. Antoine Kalananka was necessary, but he was necessary as part of the transition. He could retire or get a new position once the Empire had been properly ushered through its change- it had existed for over three centuries without a real shaking-up, and one had been bound to come along sooner or later. The Reconciliation Treaty might have worked out, and it would have been properly managed so as to result in the least amount of chaos.

But she was stuck with the Pict, and so she’d have to work with that. At least she could stall any moves Kalananka made to thoughtlessly preserve old forms by reminding people that he’d said he couldn’t replace Empress Forouzandeh, so maybe they should let him quietly slide out of the spotlight of power. No need to set the man up for embarrassment, after all, that would me mean, wouldn’t it?

“I propose discussion groups,” Cazia said. “Until eleven or so? Then we can have lunch, and bring our ideas to the larger meeting.”

No one had any better ideas, so everyone followed hers, which she’d drawn up in her head five days ago. She watched people gravitate into small groups in about the configurations she’d thought they would, and felt a quiet glee at the way she just _knew_ where the conversations would likely trend, based on who was talking to who.

Deliberately, Cazia hadn’t gone for a group. This left her free for Augustin and Deliah to take her out into the hall for _‘a talk’_ , just as she’d hoped.

“This is a _coup,_ ” Augustin accused as soon as the door had closed behind them.

“Such strong language,” Cazia said. “And I haven’t said anything untrue.”

Augustin actually _growled_ under his breath.

Now, _that_ was interesting.

“I know the game you’re playing,” he told her, and Cazia noted the odd tinge of bitterness- remorse?- in his tone. “It can result in some disastrous unexpected consequences. Just watch yourself. I’m better at subtlety than you, Senator Liukasiewicz.”

Cazia knew full well that Augustin Gebar had done similar things- the particular combination of suggestion, misdirection, and interpersonal manipulation that she was using was practically par-the-course for high-level politics in this day and age- but she wondered what he could have done to make him feel that way. _She_ hadn’t heard that he’d done one of these which had backfired like he was implying it had; but, then again, that was the nature of it. No one was supposed to notice the manipulation had happened in the first place. The entire _point_ was to seem eminently reasonable, and then let people run away with themselves.

Though her pride was a little stung by the subtlety comment. She’d be on the lookout for opportunities to prove him wrong.

“Why are you here, Deputy Governor Gebar?” she asked.

He narrowed his eyes at her.

“The premier manipulator of Imperial politics decamps _outside_ of her power base during an intergalactic crisis,” Augustin said. “It’s my job to pay attention to these things, and look into them, for the Governate and for the Governor. She’s young, and she needs my experience and advice. And don’t think that I didn’t notice that you’ve got a _quorum_ of the Imperial Senate in that room, Senator.”

“Well,” Cazia said lightly. “There would hardly be a point to all this without one. Only a quorum could press such a change in Imperial power.”

“What I don’t understand,” Deliah said. “Is why you’d invite _me._ My family-by-marriage is political poison, these days.”

“Contingency,” Cazia told her. “I have every faith that the Hunt and General Beilschmidt will be enough to turn back the Hunt- but consider the fact that we have no idea what the attrition rate is, and that Empress Forouzandeh has made such a _nice_ target of herself on Helike, just behind the front lines, but refusing to leave. Whereas, the fleets have staked their plan on drawing the Pict to Oskapus, instead.”

“You want me to replace your ships,” Deliah said. “There’s no company any longer, Senator.”

“Oh, _HabéTech_ was dissolved,” Cazia agreed. “But no one ever said that you couldn’t buy up your old properties, once the national governments have had their pick of assets, and make a _new_ company. Or even start from scratch. I’m certain there are plenty of talented people who would gladly return to work for the only part of the family that the Jagdsprinz decreed non-complicit in the archives scandal; and there’s always the truism about the benefits of new blood.”

“Forgive me if I don’t believe that that’s a good enough reason to involve me in this.”

“What if the Pict take Helike, and _then_ the fleets destroy them?” Cazia posed.

Augustin and Deliah glanced at each other.

“Unlikely,” Augustin declared.

“But _what if?_ ”

Deliah sighed.

“You’d need reconstruction money,” she said, sounding a bit defeated. “And _I_ have money.”

“The people in there are talking about who to name as a successor to the Empress under the assumption that they’ll have at least half a century to get trained,” Augustin said to Cazia. “You wouldn’t bring this second option up, unlikely as it is, unless you put a significant amount of stock in it.”

_‘Or are sincerely hoping for it’_ went unsaid, as did _‘So who would you try to put on the throne?’_

“It’s a very short list,” Cazia told them, answering the unasked question. “ _Very_ short. Only one name, really.”

* * *

It was nerve-wracking to have to sit and listen to the reports coming in from the fleet around Oskapus, rather than being there himself, but Ivan wasn’t going to let it show. He had to sound calm, and confident, and competent.

The ships engaged, trading fire. From this end, it wasn’t spectacular- just tense, as everyone in the Court Gallery with him waited breathlessly for audio updates on the situation.

The big Pict ship split up into many smaller ones after the first couple of rounds of shots, ships small enough to be much more maneuverable than the dreadnoughts and cruisers. The _Zürich_ , _Vittorio Veneto_ , and _Mars_ were providing most of the updates, since they were big enough to have almost full pictures of the battlefield. It was a running list of lost ships, from all three fleets. The Pict were taking hits- everyone was agreeing on that point- but it didn’t seem to be stopping them.

Ivan kept one eye on the lists of Hunt ships for each deployment area. The names greyed out as they were reported destroyed, or fell out of contact.

The _RSR Pontalier_ had just gone grey, some fifteen minutes into the shooting, when _Vittorio Veneto_ confirmed one of their major fears of the operation.

“We’ve had visual confirmation,” Admiral Gheri announced to the fleets. “Pict ships latched onto the _Ordelafo Faliero_ in our line-of-sight and assimilated it. All marks, the _ANV Ordelafo Faliero_ is now hostile.”

That initiated a mass scrambling across the communications channels as everyone started desperately cross-checking the lists of downed ships with what their instruments were saying. Almost all of the ships that had fallen out of contact were found to still be flying, but with guns turned on their own fleets. Their only small blessing was that no one could see any compromised Hunt ships.

_Which doesn’t mean they aren’t on their way to Honalee already,_ Ivan couldn’t keep himself from thinking.

But maybe they had been that lucky. Maybe the Pict _hadn’t_ managed to grab something with a flicker drive while no one had been looking.

Gilbert’s voice cut in in the middle of the fleet reorganization- the Hunt ships with their flicker drives switching into Honalee-space to avoid assimilation, and the Venetian and Imperial ships reorienting to break a Pict flanking maneuver that had gone almost undetected, because it had been done with captured ships.

“We fired on the _Faliero_!” Gilbert reported. “We broke it, we _saw_ it, but the Pict just spawned new ships! _That’s_ why it doesn’t look like they’re taking any hits!”

The fleets couldn’t just _not shoot_ at the Pict- but when they did, they were making things worse for themselves.

Ivan felt what hope they’d had for this plan shrivel up and die.

The Pict could survive vacuum.

* * *

He’d done this once before, even if he didn’t really remember it.

In a way, János thought it was probably better that he didn’t remember it, for this. He couldn’t use the conventional summoning ritual- only the knowledge that it worked, and the basic idea.

He’d ridden out to the myrtle forest on the edge of Orcus and Irkalla just after breakfast. Kore had shadowed him silently through her lands, but had been reluctant to approach once she realized where he was going.

Now, he sat on the ground at the edge of the forest, and let a drop of blood fall onto the paper he’d prepared before leaving the Jagdshall.

“In the name of Jagdsprinz Lord of the Wild Hunt, Protector and Enforcer, First Among Kings,” he said into the silence of the myrtle trees. “Who gave you life and love, I summon you Maria Beilschmidt, to this place to pay the debts you have incurred.”

János didn’t worry when it didn’t work the first time. He was so trusted by Hunt High Command, and given so much regard by the everyday Jäger, that no one had questioned him when he’d simply taken out the file Mosè Costa had been working on about Maria and the children and Kharad and read through it, right in the office.

Sebastian had told Legal that the Jagdsprinz had said that Maria trying to summon the Jagdsprinz to the Shining City had gotten it stuck between universes. It stood to reason that the same would apply to anyone, and going the other way.

So he just dripped more blood onto the paper, repeated himself, and grabbed Maria as soon as she appeared in front of him.

“I’m not here to arrest you,” he finally managed to tell her, once her hysterics had calmed down enough that she could actually pay attention _._ “I need you to do for me what you did for Sebastian, when you got him into the archives. I have some wrongs to right, and you can take of some of yours by helping with mine. I’ll even let you leave once we’re done.”

Maria swallowed her tears, and sniffed, trying to clear to nose.

“Where- where do you want to go?”

János raised his eyes from her face, and she followed his gaze down the road and through the trees, to the walls of Irkalla.

* * *

Nico was trying to keep everyone calm, down on the ground in Oskapus, by keeping them too busy to pay close attention to the fleet’s reports. Really, that meant it was a matter of keeping the _Jäger_ too busy to pay attention to their two-ways, because no one else was tuned in, but that couldn’t work for everyone.

_He_ had stay focused on the communications channels, after all. So _he_ wasn’t as calm as he would have liked, and his children and the other Regiment sorcerers were noticing.

At least Leberecht Beilschmidt hadn’t. Oskapus was jumpy enough, knowing that he was serving as bait for the Pict, to handle the news that the fleet wasn’t going to be able to destroy the Pict in the air.

They were going to have to land.

If this didn’t work, they were all _totally fucked._

No pressure.

“General Agresta.”

That was Ivan, directly to him.

“Marschall?”

“The corridor has been set up,” Ivan told him. “The Pict are following it. Prepare for engagement.”

Nico cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted to the sorcerers he’d assigned to triple-check the perimeter of the trap.

_“They’re coming! Fall back inside the perimeter!”_

* * *

Closing the door had given more of the semblance of privacy than anything real. The walls and door were thick enough that the words weren’t coming through, but they could hear Ludwig yelling all the same.

Zell and Heinrich looked ready to go out there and intervene, but Kiku had been watching, and stopped them.

“These are their problems, not yours,” he told them quietly. “They would not appreciate you getting involved.”

“But they’re upset,” Heinrich said.

“Marriage troubles are the not the province of the children,” Kiku said. “Adult or not, this is not a problem you are meant to bear. I will go.”

The yelling had stopped by the time he slipped out into the hallway. Feliciano was nowhere to be seen. Ludwig was sitting on the floor with his back to the wall, hunched over his drawn-up knees.

Kiku sat down next to him, shoulder-to-shoulder.

“Feli said I won’t see her again,” Ludwig said. He sounded like he was trying not to cry. “I told her I needed her to stay and she left. She ran away. She’s _always_ running away.”

Kiku leaned into his friend a little.

“What do you mean?”

The story of the argument they’d just had spilled out, complete with the emotional morass that Kiku was relieved to hear his friend had finally made some headway on- everyone who’d looked at him for the past month could tell that he had been silently stewing in negative emotions, and hadn’t been able to bring himself to say anything about it.

But this new insight into Ludwig and Feliciano’s relationship dynamic was concerning. They’d always seemed like they’d had such a happy, stable involvement in each other- maybe even weighted too heavily in Feliciano’s favor, given the way that Feliciano always turned immediately to Ludwig for help with his problems- but this _needing_ sounded very unhealthy.

And for Ludwig to freely admit that he couldn’t function without Feliciano, well-

At least he’d acknowledged that he had a problem?

“But I don’t _understand,_ ” Ludwig said, finishing the story. “She just left and she didn’t say _why,_ she just kept saying she had to go- if she’d just told me that, that I was causing a strain on her marriage or her wife said she didn’t want us spending time together or she loves her more than me, I’d understand, it makes sense, but she didn’t give me any answer and- she doesn’t _have_ to, she doesn’t have to tell me anything, she’s allowed-”

“Perhaps,” Kiku suggested delicately, trying to find a way to redirect his friend’s train of thought and stave off the state he was working himself into. “Feliciano was simply emotionally overwhelmed.”

He felt Ludwig freeze up.

_“I’m being emotionally controlling,”_ Ludwig said, voice full of horror. “God-”

“That is _not_ what I-” Kiku tried to tell him, severely alarmed by this sudden deduction, and trying to figure out what sort of thought progression could have resulted in such a declaration.

“I put too much pressure on her, I shouldn’t have said anything,” Ludwig continued. “I shouldn’t have tried to stop her, I should have let her leave when she tried the first time, you have to respect people’s boundaries, _I hurt her-_ ”

“She hurt you-”

“You shouldn’t hurt the people you love! You shouldn’t _hurt people,_ at all, _that’s wrong-!_ ”

This was rapidly spiraling out of his ability to handle, but who else was he supposed to go to? Feliciano was the reason Ludwig was in this situation, and Gilbert was at war, and Ludwig wouldn’t want to worry his children- he’d squash down everything he was feeling and as much as Kiku couldn’t handle _this_ that was not behavior he wanted to encourage-

He hadn’t thought things could get much worse, but movement down the hallway caught his eye and when he looked up, there was a great black _lion_ coming towards them.

No one had told them anything about the Hunt keeping dangerous wild animals as pets, though this one could be a sort of person he hadn’t heard of before, and not an animal, this was Honalee-

The lion butted its head into the space formed by Ludwig hunching over his knees, forcing him to sit up. It flopped on him, making a string of quiet chuffing noises, and some louder things that almost sounded like words.

Ludwig didn’t seem to know what to do with his sudden lapful of large predator, and was eyeing the lion’s lashing tail with some apprehension. Kiku was also not very comfortable with this- the lion’s front paws were mostly on his lap, and he could see the length of the claws. Lions were quite big animals, and Kiku was not a very large person.

At least Ludwig had been jolted out of his downwards emotional spiral.

The lion leaned into Ludwig, and started to rub its head all over his shoulders and face.

“ _Éła đolí gharexá ła._ ”

There was someone else in the hallway now- a young man with tired, familiar eyes, who looked like he hadn’t cared about razors or hairbrushes in a day or two, given the tangles in his long hair and the beginnings of his beard.

He huddled in at the lion’s hindquarters, hiking up his skirt.

“Nadri.”

The lion stopped rubbing all over Ludwig to look at him.

“ _Te đumaxi łuri_ ,” the stranger told the lion, who made a particularly _grumbling_ sort of noise, and licked Ludwig’s face.

The stranger sighed, took Ludwig’s hand, and put it in the lion’s mane. He himself started to stroke the lion’s back, between two large- silver wings?

Once Ludwig started petting it, the lion sighed and flopped happily.

“ _Sìtu ka_?” the young man asked, sounding worried, and Kiku realized why he’d thought of the stranger’s eyes as _‘familiar’._ It was Feliciano’s honey-brown, in a different face. And the slow, rolling language he used- it could be Romantic, though those _‘th’_ and _‘hl’_ sounds he’d been hearing didn’t sound very Latinate.

But- _winged lion._ He’d never heard of anything like that in Honalee, whereas he was quite familiar with a golden version on Venice’s flag.

“Feliciano?” Kiku asked him, in turn.

The young man flinched slightly, and pointed at himself.

“Reno Costa Kataiis,” he said, and pointed at the lion. “Nadri Costa Kataiis.”

Things were slightly awkward for a moment- how did you have a _lion_ for a child?- but then Nadri bapped Kiku with a paw, demanding to get petted.

And, well, it was hard to be awkward and upset when there was a cat to pet.

* * *

The death of Ereshkigal was underwhelming.

Maria used gold and copper wire from his kit to tie his soul to hers, told him the signals, and yanked him up and out of the universe, then pulled him back down again, right behind the Queen of Irkalla. She was standing in front of a worktable, deep within the walls of her Kingdom, consumed in her labor.

János reached, and snapped her life-force.

Ereshkigal didn’t even know he was there until she was dead, and he had her soul in his hands.

It was pathetically easy for a woman so many had held in awe for so long, and he entertained some idle thoughts about what _else_ people assumed couldn’t be done that could be a moment’s work, with the right skill set, as Ereshkigal realized what had just happened to her- _who_ had happened to her.

János was tempted- so _very_ tempted- to rend her apart, right there. She’d done it to Nia, she’d let it happen to his father, she’d done so much else; she _deserved_ it.

But that would be witchcraft, so he settled for simply holding on. A dead soul could linger for a minute or two without being or becoming a ghost, if it didn’t disappear right away, but then it _had_ to leave.

Ereshkigal couldn’t get wherever she was going while János held on to her. She screamed at him, cursed him; but he stood silent and implacable, just holding as she wisped away, _slowly,_ going to her final rest piece by piece.

When all that was left were handfuls, he let go.

The universe didn’t shift, the Jagdsprinz didn’t suddenly reappear, and he tried not to be disappointed about that.

It didn’t work.

János looked around instead, to keep his mind off it. Irkalla was just about the only place he hadn’t been in the known galaxy, and he was curious. Ereshkigal’s workbench was diverting for a moment or two, but it didn’t seem like anything groundbreaking or new to him.

Much more interesting was a door in the wall. There was bright golden light spilling from under the edge of it. It seemed warm, and inviting.

Somehow, the door opened at his touch, insubstantial but to magic as he was, in his shadow form.  

János stepped through.

* * *

There was a towering shadow standing in the darkness under the pine trees, highlighted by the golden summer sun.

“I’m dead,” Nia told the Jagdsprinz, and rolled over in the shed duff on the forest floor to put her back to it. The movement stirred up the thick, strong scent of the needles and half-dried sap, making her sneeze. “Go away.”

**Dead?**

“Ereshkigal did something to me when she banished you because we spoke the truth, and I died,” Nia said plainly. “Did you cling like this to Gwyn too? Let go and get someone else to be Jagdsprinz. I know people have been expecting Ivan to replace me ever since he showed up, but he wouldn’t like it. He wouldn’t be comfortable in it. He likes having some to give him orders. He feels safe when he has someone he can be loyal to. That’s when he does his best work. Lord Hiruz has the experience, but I don’t think he’d take it. Nico definitely wouldn’t. I’d suggest Arik but that sounds an awful lot like hereditary titles. I don’t know for sure if Árpád would, but they’d be a sound choice. They’re level-headed, they’re naturally a very calm person, and they’d be disappointed they’d have to leave the horse farm but if you asked I bet they would.”

It would probably take a bit more prodding than just _asking-_ but when Lord Hiruz and Nico didn’t take it, and the Jagdsprinz told Ivan he didn’t have to, and Arik was told why he _shouldn’t,_ Árpád would have enough of a sense of duty to leave. No matter how reluctant they were.

Terenzia could help. She’d help balance them nicely, and it wasn’t like they couldn’t lean on her for help. _She’d_ taken problems to Liesl or Odette often enough.

“Árpád doesn’t even really get angry,” Nia continued thoughtfully, and then with a little bite of annoyance as something occurred to her. “I’m sure everyone will find that a refreshing change.”

**So you think your death is to lie in dirt and rotting tree-bits for the rest of eternity?** the Jagdsprinz snorted. **I was not aware that was accepted Catholic theology.**

Damn it, it had hit on the thing she’d been avoiding thinking about, since she’d woken up warm in the gold-shafted twilight darkness of the forest.

“…I could have been a better Catholic,” she said. “If I was an _actually_ good Catholic, I would never have been Jagdsprinz. I never would have even _thought_ about going to Honalee. I would have talked Zell out of it, and maybe dragged her to _Zio_ Cris for grief counseling or something.”

She heard a little shift in the pine needles on the forest floor, and got very cross suddenly, because she knew without looking that the Jagdsprinz was amused at the thought of her making other people handle their familial emotions.

“I _should have!_ ” Nia insisted. “But I didn’t, I got involved with _you_ and magic and Honalee and now I’m dead and I didn’t want to stop being faithful, but- I’m not surprised God didn’t take me. And I’ve killed enough demons that even if I’m a bad Catholic, I guess I didn’t deserve getting thrown in with them. Anyway, I- I’m a King of Honalee. I’m full magic-using _Seelenkind._ I took myself out of the Christian system a long time ago.”

The Nations weren’t a part of it, after all. If Ereshkigal hadn’t been gathering them up, they’d be wandering ghosts over the lands their people had once inhabited.

She didn’t trust that that being wandering ghosts would be a totally bad thing, now. She hoped, that when the Jagdsprinz went back, it let the Nations go.

“So am I going to meet Honalenier dead here?” she asked, telling herself that it really was okay that she wasn’t in Heaven. God’s decisions weren’t for her to judge.

No matter how much she wanted to know that Zell and Heinrich were okay.

“Or am I going to be alone here once I get you to leave?”

She could _feel_ the Jagdsprinz rolling its eyes at her.

**You are not dead.**

“Could’ve fooled me,” Nia muttered into the pine needles.

**You are not.**

“Really, just go away,” she said tiredly, not believing it. “People _need_ you, so go find someone else to be Jagdsprinz- someone Ivan trusts and Nico and Hiruz and the others can learn to like. Let the Nations go, and make sure that you’ve got good backup when you go to face down Ereshkigal again-”

There were _teeth_ grabbing the back of her jacket. They tried to haul her upright.

“Hey!” Nia protested, and tried to slap the Jagdsprinz away.

Fire the color of the forest sunlight bloomed on her flailing hand, leaving a trail of glowing golden-amber afterimage in the air, and dying when she froze in surprise.

The Jagdsprinz let go of her, and she sat slumped on the tree duff, blinking away the afterimage.

**There is no one else for me,** the Jagdsprinz told her. **You are fire. It is your inborn talent, and it touches every bit of your magic and your soul. It has touched _me,_ these many centuries we have lived together. I cannot survive as I have been without it, and I _refuse_ to go back to how I was.**

“I’m dead,” Nia insisted.

**For a given value of dead,** it allowed, sounding exasperated. **You are no more dead than a Nation killed by a stray bullet on the battlefield. It was very close, but I reached you in time to capture your soul as it fell to pieces. There was enough of your soul-essence left to connect your parts, so long as something else supported them.**

It nudged her with its nose, and Nia realized that here, it wasn’t all shadow. There was a warm body just under that top layer of smoky, wispy darkness. She reached up to touch.

Soft.

**It was enough to keep you yourself, so long as I was careful,** the Jagdsprinz told her. **I have spent this past time using my own self to replace the majority of your soul-essence, to bind the pieces of your soul together so that _you_ would not be lost. Still, the entire time, I could only hope that I would not, on accident, simply _take_ your fire and make it my own, losing you in the process.**

Warm, damp breath blew on her ear, and she hunched her shoulder up to block it.

**I have grown fond of you. And your people return your loyalty and dedication- the best of them in a greater amount than you give. I am Jagdsprinz. I could take your place as their authority. They would listen to me, because that is their duty. In time they would learn to love me for myself, but they would always wish for you back.**

“Thank you?” Nia said.

**Thank _them,_ when we return.**

Nia was pretty sure there _was_ no returning, but the Jagdsprinz was being pretty insistent about the whole _‘not dead’_ thing.

“You said I’m reinforced with you,” she said. “Okay- but what does that _mean?_ ”

**Our souls are joined, in a different way than before. Before, I was a graft onto yours, with you being the greater part of Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor. I could not speak directly to you, nor really communicate at all, beyond showing you the souls of those you met, and my conscious self was stretched beyond safety and rightness to bind lightly into every soul of the Hunt. Now, I am free from those bonds, free to communicate directly, and _you_ are the lesser by proportion. We shall be more than we were- different than we were, both of us. One soul, with influence going each way.**

That couldn’t be right. That couldn’t work. Honalee and humanity _needed_ the Hunt, the way it had always been.

Nia’s fists clenched in her lap, and she looked down at them.

“I never said you could do that.”

**You would rather I let you die, or lose an important portion of myself as you were destroyed?**

“You said that there was a danger that you could have just taken my fire and left the rest of me to dissolve. Why not? I don’t-”

For a few seconds, she thought about not saying anything. But, no- if they were so closely tied, the Jagdsprinz would find out soon enough anyway.

“I don’t _like_ being Jagdsprinz,” Nia said. “I like what I’ve gotten from it. Political stability for everyone, peace, Odette, my children. Ivan and some of the other Jäger are good friends, and I get along well with the other Kings. Sometimes, I even like being called _‘Emperor’_. I get to feel powerful. But I _see_ things, all the time. I can’t stop it. I don’t like it. It makes it hard to _not_ be angry. Especially with- you know.”

**That is your problem.**

_Her_ problem? She wouldn’t have it if Ereshkigal hadn’t _tricked_ her into getting up with this _thing-_

“My siblings are _centuries_ dead and I robbed myself of Heaven so I can’t even _apologize_ to them, because I’ll never see them again! And _Vati_ \- if I _had_ to die, I would have rather had the destruction, because if there was nothing left of me then I couldn’t spend the rest of forever _missing_ them! And _now_ you’ve told me that you’ve gone and- and _dissolved_ the Hunt, which means that all those people I’ve been living with for centuries are going to _die_ on me, like Ivan or Diana or Mosè and maybe even Arik; and it will just be me and Lord Hiruz in the Jägerskov and _Nico_ won’t have anyone left at _all_ because Diana and his kids will be dead within the next century and Árpád is going to be stuck out on Hungary’s horse farm and they won’t even be able to _enjoy_ it, because they’ve invested centuries into that place with Terenzia! They’re going to be _alone_ and so will I and if you’d just taken my fire and let me die then _I_ wouldn’t have had to live without _Vati_ but _with_ Venice and Prussia and everyone else would just get to be _happy,_ at least after they’d gotten over losing me!”

**I have spent this past time integrating our souls,** the Jagdsprinz said. **As much as I have been able to, without your input. We are now able to leave, to return to your universe. The only thing left for me to do was find the fire- find _you,_ the core of you- and get your dedication to persevering. If you do not wish to continue on, you shall still find the oblivion you say you wish, soon enough, and I will simply take your fire.**

“Fine,” Nia said, still not looking up from her hands, and waited for it to leave.

**But consider this,** it said after a moment. **The Hunt needs a Jagdsprinz, and there are none other who I could join to in this manner. I refuse to be stretched and bound as I was amongst so many, and so the only option would be for me to come bodily into your universe. And for that, I require a body.**

_Now,_ Nia looked up at it.

“You _have_ a body,” she said suspiciously.

**Not as I need,** the Jagdsprinz told her. **I need one that can exist independently and properly where I am needed. I have your fire, I can have your body as well.**

A wave of pure revulsion washed through her.

“You _wouldn’t,_ ” Nia said. “You _can’t!_ ”

The Jagdsprinz blinked at her, an impassive look that was very much like Lord Hiruz or Ivan, when they were about to win an argument.

**If you do not continue, you will be leaving your family, your friends, your people, all those you care about, to the same fate you faced with your father. Would you do that to them?**

A breeze swished through the pines, and she smelled something burning in it. The Jagdsprinz stayed silent, waiting.

“No,” Nia said finally. “ _No,_ damn you! I won’t, I _can’t! Damn you!_ ”

* * *

The trap on Oskapus was a simple idea, based in Switzerland’s original magical walls that had held up against the Pict had surrounded his and his sister’s countries, encasing them in a dome of protection. The trap was a simple inversion of this. The Pict would land on Oskapus, looking for people and things to assimilate, be drawn to the prize of catching the planet’s Nation; and then once the Pict were all crowded onto the planet, they’d activate the protections and trap the Pict _inside_ the barriers Leberecht would activate.

The problem was that, though Nico had gotten the word that the Pict had landed, but he couldn’t _see_ any.

“You’re sure they’re here?” he asked Ivan.

“The fleets reported landfall,” was the response. “The Pict are clustering on the other side of the planet, and are creeping slowly towards your position.”

“I just thought they’d be here by now-”

“They took their time when they came to Earth,” Ivan told him. “We had enough time to plan, and attempt diversions and stalling actions. I believe they find prolonging the final step… amusing.”

“You don’t think we managed to scare them?”

Nico had almost been hoping for that. It would make things easier.

“We have no idea if they even know you are there, General. Do not get too confident in yourself.”

He wasn’t confident, he was just hoping. In a way, he almost wanted them here _now,_ so there wouldn’t be this awful _wait._

The other sorcerers were now as jumpy as Leberecht. They kept starting at the wind, and sounds in the grass and bushes, glimpses of each other out of the corners of their eyes.

Nico was considering assigning more stringent sentry positions when Leberecht edged over to him.

“How do you _stand_ this?” he asked. “ _Elti_ never mentioned anything like this.”

“Usually the Hunt isn’t in this position,” Nico told him. “We’re really more of an offensive force. Try counting out your breaths- start with three and work up through five and seven-”

The dirt shifted under his feet.

It wasn’t supposed to do that, and it was the only warning he had before the Pict exploded from under the topsoil.

Survival reflexes kicked in before he’d even really processed the threat. There was Pict on his boots and his magic was stripping it away, shredding it, before it could sink past the leather and under his skin.

People were shouting, being cut off; ground was covered in flowing white and the Pict had physically yanked Leberecht under and it was late, too late, it had only been a couple of seconds and Nico’s first coherent thought after the blank mindless reaction of using his destructive ability to enforce a non-Pict area around himself, from the surface of his clothes out for some feet, was the memory of Ahes asking, while they’d been planning this horrible disaster of a trap, how small a thing he’d ever tried destroying, had he attempted bacteria and viruses you could do a sort of healing with that-

There were microbes in the soil and if the Pict could assimilate things like buildings and vehicles then _of course_ they would be able to hide in the ground, Switzerland hadn’t been _planning_ on a Pict invasion when he’d started making his magical walls he was thinking about human armies and human armies of the times would have been used to things like digging to undermine siege works he and János and the others just _hadn’t been fucking **thinking**_ the barrier was supposed to be a _sphere,_ not a _dome!_

Nico took a breath, shoved the self-recrimination out of the way, and meant to start thinking about how he was supposed to get off Oskapus-

And then he remembered that his _children_ had been with him.

* * *

The _Mars_ and the _Vittorio Veneto_ had reported that, in the space of an instant, the Pict ground invasion of Oskapus had gone from being confined to one relatively small area on the other side of the planet from the trap to suddenly covering _everything-_ land, sea, it didn’t matter.

Oskapus was a ball of white, and there weren’t any barriers up, and no one from the trap team was answering Ivan’s hailing calls.

And then Trojana, Jelea, Oxqyama reported surprise incursions of Pict- they hadn’t followed their old patterns, they Pict had split their forces and were attacking in _more than one place,_ and the Hunt ships had to switch to Honalee-space immediately if they weren’t planet-side and destroy their equipment if they were, they couldn’t risk it, and not everyone had been evacuated yet, which was leaving the other three engagement areas with less-than-optimal strength and that could make all the difference, here.

Ivan tried calling Terenzia again, and Vasco, and Nico. No response, and he had to give up.

Trojana and Jelea reported that some Pict ships had gotten past them to the planet’s surface and right now Ivan was _glad_ that he wasn’t properly a Nation and couldn’t feel the human Jäger, because any second now the people the Hunt had placed on the planets to handle the evacuations were going to be overrun, and this way he didn’t have to feel them disappear.

Gilbert had ordered the tow-beacons for the lightspeed lanes shut down three minutes ago, for all front-line planets, so the fleets couldn’t retreat but the ships the Pict had taken from them couldn’t either.

And then _that_ was proved pointless when one of the ships around Oxqyama reported that a craft they didn’t recognize had bolted past them, ignoring the planet below, and blinked out of view as it apparently reached light speed under its own power.

Oxqyama was on the approach to Helike.

Ivan called Arik. He had been assigned to the Imperial capital, and should, at the moment, be lurking in the abandoned Imperial Intelligence offices.

“The Pict are coming, General,” he said as soon as Arik picked up. “The Empress is still being stubborn?”

“As far as I’ve heard,” Arik reported.

“Then _find her and drag her off that planet._ ”

“Yes, sir.”

Arik went to do his duty, and Ivan was halfway through calling Isolde and telling her to raise Switzerland’s old walls when he caught himself. They had no idea if they would still be able to communicate with those barriers up; and so far, the Pict had only broken the front line.

Another ten minutes, barring further developments, shouldn’t kill them. It would give Ivan time to disengage the Hunt formally from the fighting, and send on a warning and farewell to everyone who needed it.

They weren’t even twenty-five minutes past the first appearance of the Pict, yet, and everything had already fallen apart.  

* * *

If this whole thing was her, part of her soul, then she should be able to find a rock to throw when she damn well wanted one, shouldn’t she?

One didn’t appear, so Nia threw a handful of the forest duff at the Jagdsprinz. The dried pine needles and bits of bark fluttered in an unsatisfactory manner back to the ground without striking the one who’d just _emotionally blackmailed her._

“There’s no choice here,” she told it bitterly. “We’re one soul? Then you should _know_ that there wasn’t a choice, not once you told me! You’ve just- that was my _only chance!_ ”

**For what?**

_“You know what!”_

**To escape your duty?**

“To _die!_ ” Nia yelled at it. “To have half a chance to see my family again!”

**You have had your family. You built it as you built your empire.**

“My _first_ family!”

**Venice and Prussia have never been where you could not reach them.**

“They don’t count!”

**Which is why you are upset that you find it hard to not be angry with them, I presume?** the Jagdsprinz asked, tone infuriatingly mild.

“And where the _hell_ do you get off telling me _‘That is your problem’_?” Nia demanded. If the Jagdprinz was going to throw things she’d said back in her face, well, she could do that too. “That’s _you!_ I’m seeing all that because of _you!_ ”

**It is your problem,** the Jagdsprinz said. **Because my duty is expose the truth. It is not to pass judgement. That is yours. _I_ am not the one who made you angry. That is your own moral sense- and no little bad habit.**

_”Bad habit!”_

**They have done awful things, yes,** it told her. A simple shift of weight, and its entire aura changed to one of stern firmness. **But that is _not about you._ They were hurts done to other people, not to you, and you have been using their other misdeeds to prop up your feelings of betrayal over losing your father. **

“They-”

**Every other Nation,** the Jagdsprinz said. **You granted a sort of amnesty for any wrongdoing from before the time you came to them as Teufelmördor. Explain to me how those two deserve less than that.**

“That’s not the point!”

**No, it is not,** it agreed. **The real point of your continued anger is that, as strict as you can be about granting forgiveness to others, you are even worse about receiving forgiveness yourself. You insist on thinking that you cannot have the relationship you once had with Venice and Prussia. While this is true to a point- if your children slipped into witchcraft, would you forgive them?**

It did _not_ get to try to exploit the things she was most terrified of!

“I’d have to treat them the same as any other witch-”

**Not as Teufelmördor. Not for legal purposes. Would you still love them, as your children?**

“Of course I would!”

**And so,** the Jagdsprinz said. **Why would Feliciano Costa, who has had centuries more experience with betrayal and forgiveness, or at least letting live with courtesy, not do the same? Why would Gilbert Beilschmidt not? You stay angry because if you are angry you do not have to face them being more forgiving than you have been willing to be.**

Nia glared at it silently, fuming.

“You can’t know that,” she said after a moment.

**I am of the nothingness-chaos outside the universe. I see all.**

The Jagdsprinz was very close, suddenly: eye-to-eye with her. Nia jerked back at the sudden invasion of space, catching herself at the last second.

**_I SEE YOU,_** it boomed at her, it’s darkness spreading through the forest. **YOU SAY YOU ARE NO GOOD CATHOLIC, YOU ACKNOWLEDGE THAT YOU COULD HAVE BEEN BETTER? THEN I SAY TO YOU- BLESSED ARE THEY THAT MOURN: FOR THEY SHALL BE COMFORTED. BLESSED ARE THE MEEK: FOR THEY SHALL INHERIT THE EARTH. BLESSED ARE THEY WHICH DO HUNGER AND THIRST AFTER RIGHTEOUSNESS: FOR THEY SHALL BE FILLED.** **BLESSED ARE THE MERCIFUL: FOR THEY SHALL BE SHOWN MERCY. BLESSED ARE THE PURE OF HEART: FOR THEY SHALL SEE GOD. PLESSED ARE THE PEACEMAKERS: FOR THEY SHALL BE CALLED THE CHILDREN OF GOD.**

By the time it had finished, Nia was refusing to look at it.

The Jagdsprinz calmed, darkness receding. It stepped behind her and laid down, supporting her, a warm mass at her back.

“If you see all that,” she muttered. “Then you should have picked someone else while you had the chance. Somebody humble and pure of heart who can make people happy and isn’t-”

She stopped, and didn’t continue.

**I wanted you,** the Jagdsprinz said simply.

“You should have picked better,” Nia told it. “I _told_ you. You should have gone to Árpád- _they’re_ all that.”

**You are those things,** it disagreed. **In differing degrees and ways. Most of all, the hungering and thirsting after righteousness.**

The Jagdsprinz paused.

**It, is perhaps,** it said. **Rather an _over-_ developed virtue, in your case. Your failings in mercy can be laid directly at the feet of your fear that you are being insufficiently just. It causes you to look first for reasons to punish, rather than reasons to forgive.**

Nia side-eyed it, as best she could now that it was serving as her backrest.

“You can’t have gotten _that_ just from looking.”

**We have shared enough proximity, mentally and spiritually, that I know more of you than others.**

There were birds in the pines, now. Idly, Nia wondered what that was supposed to mean. This was her soul, or something, after all.

**Nia?** the Jagdsprinz asked.

She was surprised for two reason- first, that it had actually called her by her name; second, that it sounded hesitant.

“What?”

**If it does bother you so much,** it said. **Seeing what Venice and Prussia have done. Then I could not show you.**

“You can _do_ that?”

**Now that I am free of being so stretched and bound to the entire Hunt, yes. I can show you, or tell you, whatever you like. So long as I can see it.**

Nia flashed for a moment on _‘I see all’_ , and repressed a shudder. No one should have that sort of power.

“Can we talk about it later?”

**Of course. There will be time, once we return.**

“ _That’s_ what we need to talk about right now, actually,” Nia said. “I can tell you don’t want to go back to how you were, with the being bound to everyone- but the Hunt _needs_ that. I can’t do the whole job myself.”

**I am not preventing you from retaining your people.**

“But if they’re _not_ bound to you, I’m going to lose them of old age!” Nia said. “I- I told you about that already, I don’t _want_ to be left alone, not like that- but beyond me the _Hunt_ needs them, like that. We need the expertise, experience, and ease that people develop, when they’re doing this job for so long.”

**I will _not_ be bound!**

“Can’t we come up with something like-”

She knew what she was trying to come up with, but had to grope for the way to explain it.

“Like with the Pict, where they’re always _there,_ but it’s different when Serafina DiAngeli is being the Speaker of the Pict. She _is_ the Pict, but they’re also all over.”

**I do not understand.**

“You stay with me, with this- one soul influenced both ways thing, and you aren’t tied _directly_ to everyone else. But they’re still part of it, and I can still call a Hunt.”

**Are you asking for something like being a Nation?**

“Maybe! Kind of. Look- _I’m_ going to be Jagdsprinz no matter what. That’s a- that’s an active connection. Couldn’t you somehow be cone- no, the _Jäger_ are passively connected to you- us. Whatever. I don’t see why we can’t have the Hunt the way it’s always been, but without you being suppressed.”

**If we went back,** the Jagdsprinz said. **And tried to replicate what was, then _you_ would get to experience being bound first-hand. Even if I were willing to subject myself to it again, I would not, because you would have to come with me. **

“Then maybe we can _make_ Ereshkigal fix it,” Nia said grumpily.

**Ereshkigal is dead.**

_“What!”_

**János Héderváry killed her, perhaps five minutes ago. I said that we were able to return- that is why.**

“Did she come back?”

The Jagdsprinz looked at her.

**What do you mean?**

“To Kharad,” Nia clarified. “I remember I saw her leave, János drove her off. I thought she’d run for good.”

**Nia,** the Jagdsprinz said. **That was a month ago.**

“I’ve been out for a _month!_ ”

**They all believe you are dead. The Silent Hills are consumed with civil war. The Pict have moved on humanity, and the Ramman stand by, on Nanshe’s orders.**

“And you didn’t _tell me!_ ”

**We had to talk,** the Jagdsprinz said, sounding a bit miffed. **You would not have listened had you known that there were crises afoot, and you _had_ to listen. I had to explain.**

 Nia stood up and brushed the duff off her clothes.

“You’ve said everything I need to hear,” she told it. “My people are in danger, and there’s no Hunt while I’m here. I’m waking up. _Now._ ”

* * *

“ _Papà_!”

Nico whirled at the familiar, so-welcome voice, and saw Terenzia, clutching her brother, both of them with Pict white trying to crawl up their legs but sliding off.

He stepped forwards, and his daughter took two hasty ones back.

“No!” she shouted, scared; and then calmed when he froze. “ _Papà-_ what you’re doing. If you don’t make it just target the Pict, our protections are going to be torn apart.”

That’s what he was-

He wasn’t, Nico realized. He was the center of a yard-radius circle of total destruction. There was no Pict in it, but he’d stripped the ground clear of any signs of life right down through the soil. He couldn’t even find any grass roots as he pushed the suddenly-loose dirt around with a foot.

_Little bit of overkill, there,_ he told himself, and modulated the field effect to include only the Pict. He nodded to his children, and Terenzia and Vasco fairly threw themselves into his circle of protection.

_“How-”_

“Terenzia remembered when she went after Cassiel Navin, Arik was with her, he did something,” Vasco babbled, catching him a tight hug. Nico carefully hugged him back, making sure that lowering his hands didn’t leave them open to the Pict.

“Arik tried to assimilate him so we could drag him back,” Terenzia told him, joining the hug. “Navin made some sort of- magical armor, magical shielding, I don’t know, but wherever Arik tried to get him he called up enough magic for it to be visible from under wherever Arik was targeting, and he slid right off. I just- the Pict showed up and- I didn’t even really _think_ about it I could just _feel_ the Pict starting to get me- Vasco was the closest one-”

And Nico thanked God for that, fervently and silently, as he held his children tightly.

“ _Papà_ ,” Vasco said. “How are we supposed to get out?”

Nico didn’t have an answer to that, and just wanted to keep holding them for a minute or two more. He was starting to shake as he stared blankly at the dirt, just _being_ here, with his children, who were safe-

The bare dirt sparked a memory- a double-layered one, really, of himself remembering Ahes’s questioning about how small a thing he could destroy. All the grass and roots were gone, and for the area to have stayed protected like this, he must have subconsciously extended the destructive field effect to mirror his thoughts on Switzerland’s protections.

So he’d had to have _completely_ cleansed the dirt around them from microbes-

But he’d thought that it made sense that could take just _regular_ dirt too, right?

Nico knelt down and picked up and handful of ground.

It wasn’t dirt. It was a very fine, soft powder, dark grey on the top layer but white underneath, and seemed very heavy for the amount he’d picked up.

“What happened to it?” Terenzia asked. To set the boundaries of the trap they hadn’t had a chance to spring, they’d dug up some of the ground. It _had_ been regular loam.

“I don’t know,” Nico told her.

But it didn’t contain any Pict. That worth a lot.

_‘if you destroy things,’_ the Ahes of his memory said. _‘How thoroughly can you do it?’_

He stood back up.

“Terenzia,” he said. “Could you add me to what you were doing with Vasco?”

“Of course,” she told him. “You’re going to-”

“I’m going to try something. Come here.”

He grabbed his children in a hug again, encircling them with his arms as totally as he could. This was going to be another field effect, and he didn’t want them caught in it.

Terenzia covered them all in a layer of magic, and Nico dropped the destructive barrier he’d kept up. The Pict flowed in, trying to take them, and he shuddered.

But they were close enough now. His new plan was to push his destructive field as far out as he could, getting as many of the Pict as he could. He’d do it again, as many times as he had to, until the planet was a clear as he could make it.

He’d spent a morning in constant battle with a demon. He could do this.

Nico let his power go, blasting outward and focusing smaller, smaller, looking for limits he’d never tested because he’d never thought about them-

He didn’t find them.

* * *

Arik hadn’t yet gotten to Forouzandeh when the Pict made landfall on Helike, washing relentlessly over the planet from point of impact, only a minute or so after Ivan had told him to get moving.

What saved him was his half-Pict heritage, which gave him a natural resistance to unexpected assimilation. He fought his way out of the building and took to the air as a dragon, dislodging gripping, gelatinous white tentacles as he gained height, and made a few swooping runs to fireblast the new ground cover with prejudice.

It had no effect on the Pict as a whole, but there was nothing else he could really do. There were no naturally spacefaring animals, and no one was going to risk dropping a ship in here to get him, and Arik wasn’t sure he could open the World Gate in flight, or in this form.

Until he dared try, he was stuck on Helike.

It occurred to him that he couldn’t even call back to Martigny to inform Ivan or the others that he was even _alive,_ and his next fireblast was hotter and more sustained than the others, focused on the roiling mass that had once been the Imperial Residence.   

To his surprise, the Pict flowed away from the fire, clearing a space on the roof.

Were they trying to entice him to land? He wasn’t _stupid-_

A woman walked out into the middle of the cleared area.

Arik banked, settling into a circling pattern, focusing his eyes until he could make out who it was.

Forouzandeh.

“I know that’s you, Arik!” she called to him. “Come down, _Kind_!”

No, not Forouzandeh- it just looked like her.

It was his _mother._

* * *

_“Sir!”_ one of the bridge officers shrieked, and Gilbert suddenly went very, very calm; because the only reason to panic that much would be that the Pict had left the planet, and attached themselves to the _ISS Mars._

He wasn’t going to make it back to Earth.

He’d never accepted death before. It was a very strange feeling.

_“Sir!”_ the _Mars_ ’s peacetime captain, now acting as his personal aide, just about yelled in his ear, jolting him out of the unnatural calm. “Oskapus-!”

Gilbert could see a display, enlarged so that the whole bridge could see it, showing instrument results that had suddenly jumped wildly, and were still climbing. It took him a moment to realize he was looking at the radiation gauges.

And then the proximity alarms went off. The everyone jerked sideways as emergency protocols gunned the engines without adjusting the artificial gravity. They were now accelerating, at appreciable speed, away from Oskapus.

_“What the fuck is this!”_ Gilbert yelled over the alarms.

_“The sensors think we-”_ a bridge tech yelled back, and then the alarms cut out as someone muted them.

“Sir,” the tech continued at normal volume, while those who had fallen over picked themselves up. “The passive scanners thought we’d come too close to a star. That’s why the alarms went off, and the course automatically changed.”

“We’re nowhere near this system’s star!”

“It’s Oskapus, General,” the first bridge officer who’d spoken told him. “It was just- suddenly it started to give off massive amounts of radiation- visible electromagnetic, x-ray, gamma, alpha particles- just about every sort. The external visuals shut off because we would have blinded ourselves trying to look at it and extra heat shielding came on. I don’t know what’s going on, sir, this sort of thing just doesn’t spontaneously _happen._ ”

“So the Pict,” Gilbert said.

“Well, I wouldn’t think so, sir. All of it _here_ was down on the planet, and they would have destroyed themselves. I’d say, based on what the scanners are picking up, that they breached a nuclear reactor but it’s too _big_ for that-”

The readings on the radiation gauges were falling just as swiftly as they’d climbed. Gilbert’s field was not nuclear physics, but he knew _very well_ that radioactive material didn’t decay that fast.

The external visual display came back up. Last he’d seen it, Oskapus was covered in white- now, it was a uniform light grey.

“Radiation levels still falling,” someone reported as Gilbert stared at the planet, trying to figure out what in the name of God had just happened. It didn’t _look_ like the Pict were there any longer, but there weren’t any signs of exposed ground cover or even _water,_ either.

“Mark Three, Mark Three,” the person manning the communications hub in the Jagdshall was saying in his ear. “Report. Mark Three- _ISS Mars,_ report!”

The short, familiar sound of a new line cutting in interrupted the operator.

“Gilbert?” Ivan asked him directly. “What just happened.”

“No damn clue,” Gilbert muttered to him. “Massive sudden radioactivity, then nothing. No sign of the Pict, no idea what could have-”

“Mark Zero to Mark Four,” he heard from Ivan’s end; and then in his own earpiece as Ivan hung up on him. “Mark Zero to Mark Four. General Agresta to the Hunt, can you hear me?”

Gilbert flicked the audio to _Mars_ ’s bridge speakers.

_The ground force was still alive._

“Marschall Braginski to General Agresta- why are you calling on your daughter’s number?”

“Mine’s gone, sir,” Nico reported. There was dead silence in the dreadnought as the crew listened to the impossible. “It’s just me and my children now- we lost everyone else.”

“Oskapus?”

“Him too. We got surprised by the Pict, sir, they came at us through the ground. We never had a chance to try the trap.”

“But _you’re_ still here,” Ivan said, and Gilbert had known him long enough to hear the cynical disbelief under the bland tone.

“I can prove it,” Nico told him, and then said: “Desolate.”

It was smart of Ivan, Gilbert had to give him credit for that, once Terenzia and Vasco provided different random words, and he realized that they were personal, pre-arranged passcodes. He hadn’t considered exploiting the known fact that the Pict couldn’t access the memories of those they’d assimilated to come up with a way to definitively tell if someone was assimilated or not.

“What the hell did you _do?_ ” Gilbert demanded once the check-ins were done. “We just had _massive_ radioactivity readings from the surface of the planet, and now they’re back down to normal levels again, and the Pict are gone!”

He paused.

“The Pict _are_ gone, right?”

“They’re gone,” Vasco confirmed.

“You said- _radioactivity?_ ” Nico asked.

“ _Yes,_ radioactivity! Enough that our passive scanners decided we were about to run into a star!”

“I might have overdone it,” Nico told them weakly. “On the _‘how thoroughly can I destroy something’_ front.”

It took a moment for the implications of that to sink in.

_“Nicodemo Terenzio Agresta Fernandez,”_ Ivan bit down the line. “Are you telling me that you just used an entire planet’s worth of Pict as fuel for a massive improvised nuclear reaction?”

“Oh God, we’re standing in powdered lead, aren’t we?” they heard Vasco, faintly, through the line. “Full radioactive decay makes _lead-_ ”

_“General Agresta.”_

“I might have,” Nico said, strained. “Wasn’t trying to. Can someone come pick us up before we breathe in any more of this?”

* * *

This hadn’t happened with Sebastian it had worked perfectly with Sebastian what did this _mean-_

The only thing keeping Maria from running right back to the Shining City was that she knew she hadn’t lost Sorcerer Héderváry because she didn’t know where Ereshkigal was any longer, which meant that she was dead, and Sorcerer Héderváry had stayed around long enough after Ereshkigal disappeared that she really didn’t think that _he’d_ been killed.

But she _couldn’t find him._

If he’d- she should go look. There were people who’d want his body, if she was wrong.

Maria stepped into Irkalla, where she’d dropped János, and didn’t see him. There was only Ereshkigal, dead on the floor, and a nearby open door, filled with golden light. It was a pretty light, soft; but she didn’t like it.

Should she take Ereshkigal somewhere? To the Hunt? They’d want to know she was dea-

A different door slammed open and Mayet burst into the room in a swirl of feather cloak and fury, eyes ablaze.

Maria became very conscious of how she was standing right next to a corpse.

Mayet didn’t shriek, didn’t scream- just lunged, and Maria shoved her away, tried to do what she’d seen Ahes do, and fold space so Mayet ended up back outside.

However Ahes had done it, she didn’t copy it properly. Space folded, twisted, and Mayet got caught up in it, bending and breaking and snapping and Maria was left with an accusing, bloody mangled mess and oh God she’d _killed someone;_ Mosè had already called her a witch and the Jagdsprinz had accused her and she hadn’t meant to do any of that, not with the Shining City and not with the Hunt and not now with Mayet, but lately it felt like she couldn’t escape _not meaning to_ and _Elti_ would be so, so _ashamed_ of her-

She threw herself back to the Shining City, no longer caring that much where Sorcerer Héderváry had gone, and why she’d lost him. Wherever he was, he was better off for not being around _her,_ with magic it seemed like she’d never really been able to understand or control and it was probably _her_ fault he was gone, anyway, what had she _done-_

“Maria?”

She wanted to be happy, she really did; but her _Elti_ was sitting up on the bed in her workshop and looking at her so any second now she’d _see_ and she’d- she’d-

Her _Elti_ hugged her, tightly, unexpectedly.

“It’s going to be okay,” she told her, quietly. “It’s going to be okay. Maria, you’re all right.”

She was crying too hard to be able to talk, and taking big gulps of air between sobs, which was making her break out in hiccups. She felt _awful,_ and _Elti_ was being _nice_ about everything she’d just _killed_ someone and there was everything else-

“You’re all right,” _Elti_ repeated; and then her voice changed.

**World-builder,** the Jagdsprinz said. **Maria. We are needed. Take us to Helike, _now._**

* * *

Roderich was still trying to reassure Ludwig’s children that Kiku could take care of him- to much less effect than Erzsébet, he was not surprised to find- when the world changed.

It didn’t go back to normal, because it couldn’t be normal here. Austria didn’t exist any longer. There were just the very few Jäger that still thought of themselves as Austrian, the very faint sense of the borders he was used to, and-

_János._

Nations were accustomed to the noise of their people in their heads. It was background, most of the time, and the only people who stood out strongly were any you happened to be close to- bosses, usually, but human friends too, if you had them.

His son had always stood out to him; there was no way he couldn’t have.

But now it felt like what Roderich remembered of his empire, being the titular head but sharing people and land with other Nations, under him.

It was again stronger than that, though. It was almost like what Erzsébet had been like, almost-equal in official status if not reality-

Except.

János felt stronger.

Stronger than him.

Blindly, Roderich reached for wife, and found her hand. She squeezed it as the sound of the door opening reached his ears. Ludwig and Kiku had come back into the room, and gone for their children. Zell and Heinrich were clinging to him, and Roderich noted, vaguely, that Ludwig looked oddly dazed.

“Huh.”

He looked to the voice, and saw Poland standing next to his wife.

Where had _he_ come from.

“Where did _you_ come from?” Erzsébet demanded.

Feliks waved a hand, vaguely.

“I was like, half-convinced your son was totally trolling us,” he answered, looking around the room in interest. “But _woah._ ”

“You’ve seen János?” Roderich asked.

“Yeah,” Feliks said. “Like, thirty seconds ago, he was leaving. Did you know that your son is terrifying?”

“Excuse me?” Erzsébet asked, surprised. Roderich didn’t think she sounded offended enough. János had… _problems,_ yes; but he wasn’t terrifying. He was a good, kind person; he knew that, he’d raised the man.

_“Terrifying,”_ Feliks repeated, with a certain amount of glee and relish, like this was the latest bit of gossip. “We were just like, hanging out, being dead, free of responsibility, pondering the meaning of life and all that shit and whether we wanted to enter the next stage of our post-life adventures, yeah? And then-”

He made an exploding motion with his hands.

“There’s János! _Totally_ surprised about where he’d walked into, by the way, funniest thing I’ve seen in _years._ So we do the whole, like _‘you’re dead!’ ‘no I’m not!’ ‘no, YOU’RE dead’_ thing, and then he tells us the _total shit_ Ereshkigal has been getting up to since like, _forever;_ so a bunch of us decided, _‘fuck this shit’_ , and now we’re taking a look around? So yeah, like, your son, _totally terrifying,_ Ereshkigal’s dead and he did it.”

“He _what,_ ” Roderich wheezed.

Not _his_ son!

Feliks clapped him on the back.

“I know it doesn’t like, feel like it right now?” he said. “But that’s a complement, the kids that survived this long are _bad. Ass._ He’s _fine,_ don’t worry about it, he’s coming back right now. Give him my compliments.”

Erzsébet made an incoherent noise that could have encompassed anything from _‘our son cannot be a murderer’_ to _‘what do you **mean,** the next stage of your post-life adventures?’_.

He was pretty hung up on those two points, himself. In fact, he was feeling rather faint.

“I’m gonna go find Toris, he has _got_ to see what I did to Vilinus when I had it. _Cześć_!”

Roderich was just going to sit down for a little while.

* * *

Arik was wondering if he could kill the Pict if he set his mother on fire, only a few seconds after she’d first called to him from the roof in Forouzandeh’s body, when the white mass of Pict _rippled._

The air was split by a searing, high-pitched shriek that made him jump, throwing off his course; and the Pict surged below him and reached up, not trying to assimilate this time but merely pull him down. He was hauled out of the air onto the roof, where he crashed at his mother’s feet.

Her expression was utterly enraged, twisted into a snarl. There was a murderous light in her eyes.

“Kill _us!_ ” she hissed. “Kill _us,_ destroy _us! Defy-_ it has been long enough, we never should have let you grow into your power; they take us _we take you-_ ”

Arik tried to twist free, but the Pict were holding on tightly and a dragon’s scales gave them a good grip. Some forced its way into his mouth, oozing through his teeth, and started to slither down his throat.

“We can’t absorb you then you take _us_ into you!”

There was more, too much, he was starting to choke on Pict. Arik inhaled frantically, air whistling through the scant gaps still left, and tried burning it them out. The blocked fire backwashed down through him in burning agony and he switched forms on instinct, his amorphous Pict-like between stage momentarily freeing him from their control-

But that wasn’t a sustainable form, for him, and the Pict curled tightly around his human body. He’d managed to clench his jaw shut and clap a hand over his mouth and nose but it wasn’t going to be a good enough shield, and you needed a lot less stuff to choke a human than you did a dragon, his magic would automatically heal him and Arik had no doubt that the Speaker would leave him here while the Pict took the rest of the galaxy and he’d be spending the rest of eternity choking, reviving, choking, long past the point where he went mad with it, as his father had in Tartarus.

And then shadow rushed past him, around him. It held him close, stripped the Pict away and left only comforting lightlessness, somehow thick, and if the Pict couldn’t find him in this then he was _safe._

Pale green light bloomed, the color of his magic when he healed, and a streak of darkness wove around it, details and contours of a half-there body, of bleeding borders and solidity that could become smoke in an instant, somehow highlighted in the silence.

A red eye burned in sharp contrast to the green, and the reflection of the light glittered on sharp teeth in a deer’s face.

The green light disappeared as the Jagdsprinz swallowed it, and the encompassing darkness collapsed, rushing back to its origin.

Arik didn’t know if he shouted, or if it was all in his head; but his _Elti_ turned and looked at him anyway. The Speaker of the Pict was nowhere to be seen and the Pict weren’t moving and he didn’t need to be told they’d been killed, the Jagdsprinz was here and the Pict had broken their contract.

“ _Schattchen_ ,” his _Elti_ whispered to him, the pet name he’d long outgrown; and she was _here,_ they were hugging, he was crying.

He didn’t know how long they stood there, but eventually he’d cried himself into a stuffed nose and a pounding headache, and _Elti_ was trying to get his attention.

“You're being called, Arik,” she said quietly.

Ivan’s voice was demanding an update from his two-way; General we can ping you have you got the Empress are you off Helike yet have the Pict arrived do you feel it to, _the Hunt is back-_

“Can’t,” Arik told her, voice hoarse and not up to anything else.

She nodded, understanding; and then looked puzzled. She pulled away from him and looked at her hands, then checked her ear.

“Where’s Idunn?”

“I took her back to the Jagdshall-”

Maria? Maria was here too, that made a sort of sense but at the same time she looked miserable and scared and he knew very well what Mosè wanted her for and he wished she’d run away again and felt bad for feeling guilty that he’d wished that.

“-I knew the Pict were coming and they were pretty sure they were but I _knew,_ I could see it, so I told Idunn and then left her for _Dydaya_ Vanya and _Mère_ and the others-”

His little sister was babbling, and he recognized the symptoms from people who’d just had their first really big scare. Arik reached for her, and pulled Maria against him. She huddled, and hid her face in his jacket, breathing deeply.

_Elti_ smiled at them, a soft little thing, and Arik let himself feel hopeful- just a little.

“You did a good job, Maria,” she said. “Thank you. Arik?”

She didn’t have to say what she wanted- she’d asked after Idunn, and he couldn’t talk right now. He handed over his two-way, and she clicked their end on.

“Ivan.”

The Nation had still been talking down the line, trying to get someone to answer him. Now he’d fallen abruptly silent.

“Sir?” he said, voice quavering. Arik had never thought he’d hear the Marschall so close to losing his composure to anything besides anger, but here they were.

“I’m back. Let’s start fixing this mess.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who's interested, when the Jagdsprinz yells at Nia it's quoting Matthew 5:4-9


	14. Fragile Things

* * *

 

**PART FOUR: BLESSED ARE THE MERCIFUL**

_“I have always found that mercy bears richer fruit than that of strict justice”  
-Abraham Lincoln-_

 

* * *

 

_‘This mess’_ was rather too big to deal with at once- the Pict were handled, but the fleets had to assess their losses and come home, Honalee was still in turmoil and as far as Nia knew no one had informed the Kings of Ereshkigal’s death, the Hunt was down a significant portion of people who _had_ been formerly on duty as police on Imperial worlds, and the Imperial State was currently without leadership.

She couldn’t do anything to get the fleets back faster and the leadership of the Imperial State wasn’t her business to decide and recruitment for new Jäger would have to wait at least a few days out of respect for those lost, but she _could_ do something about Honalee.

“Ivan,” Nia said. “I’m going to go handle the civil war.”

“You need to speak to Chicomoztoc and the Steppes, as well,” Ivan told her. “They have renounced their Kings.”

She didn’t know what that meant, exactly, but it sounded like a headache and a half. She was about to ask for clarification when there was a strange little _shift,_ inside, and the Jagdsprinz neatly deposited the information into her mind- the original decisions at the Court of the King of Chicomoztoc, the announcement at the meeting Amphitrite had called, the news getting back to the Hunt, public reaction to it all-

It should have felt like too much at once, but it didn’t.

“I will,” Nia told him, and paused a moment on what to say next. There was business to be done, reassurances that needed to be made, a month’s worth of missed news and work to handle and surely some important things had been shoved down the to-do list because of war preparations-

_‘You do not have to face them being more forgiving than you have been willing to be,’_ recent memory prodded her.

She looked at Arik, holding Maria; and listened to Ivan’s breathing over the two-way as he held it too close; and remembered what Isolde had told her forty years ago, that she’d been hurting her children their whole lives with the family feud and that they’d all kept away from Venice and Prussia, despite their own curiosity and willingness to try to be family, because they knew how she felt.

Maria and Sebastian were fast friends with Reno and Nadri. Nia wasn’t sure if they thought of themselves as family- she’d never asked, because she wasn’t sure what she’d do if they’d said _‘yes’._ They could have a relationship, but her and Venice-

But the Jagdsprinz had felt it important enough to keep her from coming to deal with all of this to tell her that it was her own stubbornness and emotions that were keeping them apart.

“Nia?” Ivan asked.

“Once I’m done with Honalee I need to talk with Venice and Prussia,” Nia told him. “Can you get someone to bring the General ahead of the fleets?”

“Nico is with him.”

That would work nicely.

Now, she just had to _talk_ to them. She didn’t want to do that without a little support beforehand.

“Where’s Odette?”

“I am not exactly sure,” Ivan said. “I will-”

“Sankt Michelmarc’s, _Elti_ ,” Maria spoke up.

“No, you don’t need to,” Nia told Ivan. “I’ll come to the Jagdshall when I’m done with Honalee.”

“We will be here,” Ivan promised. It wasn’t like the Hunt would be anywhere else, but that wasn’t the point- it was a reminder that they’d all waited, that they’d hoped she’d come back, that they cared and were happy she’d returned.

**They love you,** the Jagdsprinz said, somewhere that wasn’t her head but was just as private and silent to others all the same. **I told you- they return your loyalty and dedication with more than you give them.**

_It should be equal,_ Nia thought back at it.

**You must care for many people; but there is only one of you. It is equal overall.**

She had a sudden impulse, and felt uneasy about it, though it wasn’t enough to put her off trying. She reached for Ivan through their bond as ruler and Nation, noticing as she did that all her Nation bonds were strangely quiet and dormant.

**You lost much of yourself,** the Jagdsprinz told her. **They will awake when you reach back- they have not been damaged.**

Ivan reached back, a warm, steady presence of _happinessrelieflove;_ and that was enough to bolster her confidence.

“ _Spasibo, moy brat_ ,” Nia told him, before she could decide not to; and felt his wide smile and his swell of joy and pleasure, different from his reaction to her children calling him _‘Dyadya Vanya’_ only in magnitude and circumstance.

“ _Pozhalovat’, moy brat,_ ” Ivan replied in turn. “ _Moy tsar_.”

She clicked the two-way off and handed it back to Arik.

“Get him back to the Jagdshall?” she asked Maria. “And both of you tell your siblings you’re safe, I’m sure they’re worried.”

Maria had her eldest brother back in Martigny in an eyeblink. Nia took a steady breath, looked a last time at the Imperial capital, buried under the white mass off the dead Pict, and stepped herself to Sankt Michelmarc’s.

It was a respectably old cathedral, now, and she was a bit surprised that it was so quiet. She wasn’t sure how she would have felt to find that there were still tourists around on a day like today; but she’d thought that surely _some_ amount of people would have come to pray, or that the Bishop of Martinach would have held a service.

She’d come into the narthex, between the cathedral doors and the entrance to the church proper. The outside doors, leading to the stairs down to the square, were shut; but the ones to the church proper were open. It seemed empty.

But Maria had said Odette was here, and she was never wrong about that sort of thing, so Nia started to walk down the nave. It was beautifully lit from the early afternoon sunlight streaming in from the high west windows of the apse, over the sanctuary and altar.

Some people _had_ been here today, though, definitely. There were votive candles, some burned out, some still lit, in the side chapels. Most were in the two closest to the narthex, the ones that were original to the building she’d had commissioned in the 21st century, to the cathedral’s joint patrons- the Archangel Michael as patron of police officers and soldiers, and Saint Mark as patron of barristers- but there were enough lit to Saint George as patron of knights and cavalry, and Saint Eustace as patron of hunters and help in hard times, to put a shine on the gilt.

Saint Mark and Saint Eustace shared a wall, and Nia stopped a moment in the nave to glare at the latter, as she always did when no one was looking. She was still slightly annoyed that no one had made any comments about the major renovations two centuries ago, part of which had been adding Saint Eustace’s chapel. _She_ would have blocked it, if she’d had her way, but it wasn’t like she owned the place- and anyway, she was the Emperor. It would be an abuse of power if she _had_ said anything against what the cathedral board had decided to do on a matter of opinion.

Okay, _fine,_ a lot of the Catholic Jäger really did like him, and so did the civilians from Martigny. But she was _certain_ that it had originally been an irreverent joke, and had been ever since she’d seen the logo for the Hunt’s general Christian association all the way back in the 2100s, because there wasn’t a lot you could do given a stylized stag’s head and a cross, and Saint Eustace’s cross-held-in-antlers was common and popular.

And now it was _in the cathedral._

**I like it,** the Jagdsprinz remarked.

_Shut up,_ Nia told it. _It’s very nearly sacrilegious._

**It is perfectly fine to have a bit of a sense of humor about your faith.**

_This is a serious topic!_

**Attitudes like this are why the deacons are scared to talk to you.**

_They are not._

**They think, that if they try to approach you, you will eventually begin ranting about traditionalism and decrying every reform and edict from the Restructuring onwards.**

_There was a time when people considered me a dangerous liberal,_ Nia grumbled at it.

**The political center passed by while you were occupied guilting people into treating others better and hounding them out of authority when they wouldn’t,** the Jagdsprinz informed her, sounding mildly amused. **Now they consider you somewhat stiffly conservative. Congratulations on making the galaxy a more understanding, supportive, and peaceful place.**

_I’m still liberal in Honalee,_ Nia reminded it, turning away from the side chapels. An edge of Tylwyth-blue cloth caught her eye, peeking out from the front row of pews- she’d found her wife. _Go away. This isn’t your place, anyway._

**Hm,** the Jagdsprinz said, but the feeling of its attention retreated until it was almost like she was alone again.

Nia was still surprised that Odette had chosen to come to the cathedral, but surprise changed to an almost guilty sadness as she came up behind her wife, kneeling on the floor in front of the first row of pews, facing the altar.

She was in Tylwyth mourning, partly done. Odette had pulled her hair out of its regular, carefully-constructed traditional architectural styles to spill out across the floor in multi-length streamers of brown, gold, and dusty red ochre, as was proper for a mourning Lady. The gold-plated pins and clips that held whatever style she’d left the rooms with were in a pile on the floor beside her. She hadn’t changed into the proper robes to go with such a display, but was still wearing the tailored couture she favored as her everyday wear as Empress of the _Groβjagdsreich._ Nia would have thought she’d come here directly from a meeting, except that Odette had draped the great two-tiered undyed lace shawl of deep mourning over her head and shoulders, which she would have had to retrieve from the formalwear storage their rooms.

Odette had brought Nia’s Bible and rosary along, as well. She held the rosary in her hands, still and limp, not counting out prayers on the beads, even though there was a prayer card propped on the open Bible. Nia wasn’t sure what part her wife had been reading, because another paper was laying on top of the pages. The type was too small to read from here, but the half-filled sheet had the official imperial letterhead at the top.

Nia reached out and tugged the shawl off Odette’s head.

“No mourning today, _llacharad,_ ” she said softly; and her wife looked up at her shock, and then they had an armful of each other and Odette was trying to find purchase against the brigandine jacket of Nia’s armor, her face buried in the thick fur of the cape on her shoulders. Nia held her carefully, trying not catch the potentially-fragile lace of the shawl on the roughened leather of the palms side of her heavy gloves.

“I’m here. I’m here,” Nia murmured. “I’m all right. I’m back. We’re safe.”

Odette tilted her head so that her mouth and nose were free of the fur, leaving her able to breathe and speak again.

“The Pict-”

“Dead. All of them. It. Whichever.”

“Ereshkigal-”

“Dead. It was János.”

Odette stopped trying to find something to hold onto on Nia’s armor and tightened the circle of her arms, instead.

“I,” she said, voice quavering. “I was going to announce your death today. Later. When we heard from the fleets. We hadn’t yet, we were putting it off because we were scared everyone would panic. Things were falling apart, and if people didn’t know for _certain_ then maybe it would fall apart slower; but the Pict were coming and even if we lived it wouldn’t matter because they’d all _know._ ”

  “Well it’s a good thing you didn’t yet,” Nia told her, trying to sound positive. “That could have been very awkward, if I’d turned up after everyone had been told. We never would have lived it down.”

Odette managed a wet, weak laugh.

“Your uncle might have told some people,” she said.

“ _Zio_ Cris is here?” Nia asked. “Where? I didn’t see him-”

“The Pope told him to come here, because we knew Martinach would be safe behind Switzerland’s old magical barriers,” Odette said. “He said the Church had to survive. The city asked everyone to stay home today if they could, but some people came here to pray, and they felt like they were intruding once they found out I was here, so your uncle went out to sit on the steps and pray with people there.”

She pulled away enough to look Nia in the face.

“You should go out there and show people you’re back- there were government employees, and the _Press Current_ ’s field office is just across the square, if _they_ put out the news then everyone will know it’s true right away-”

She had to go to Honalee, but she could spare a few minutes more.

“I’ll do up your hair,” Nia offered. She didn’t _really_ know how to do her wife’s Tylwyth Court styles, but she could be talked through the simpler ones.

Odette smiled, but shook her head.

“Leave it be for now. You need to be outside.”

Nia helped her pick up her pins and clips, and retrieved her Bible. The sheet that had been lying on it was the script for Odette’s planned death announcement. Nia folded it up and closed it in the Bible.

They were at the cathedral doors when Odette tugged on her to stop, expression suddenly worried- and a bit scared? Uncertain?

“Nia,” she said, and her grip tightened. “I don’t _want_ you to be-”

“I know.”

Odette took a shaky breath.

“Then _how?_ ”

“The Jagdsprinz is holding me together,” Nia told her, lifting her hand to kiss it. “I’m here, this is real- I _promise._ ”

“So,” Odette said, emotions clear now. She was afraid, and Nia wasn’t sure what to do to make the fear go away. “You’re not really better. You’re not healed.”

“I don’t know if it’s something that could have been healed,” Nia said. “But- _llacharad,_ I’m not going to fall apart on you. I’m _not._ I’m here, I’m safe, I’m me still.”

Odette sniffed. She didn’t say anything, and didn’t look totally convinced, but nodded her head.

“I love you,” Nia told her firmly. “That’s why I’m here. I had to tell you that, Odette, before I started taking care of anything else.”

Her wife took her Bible from her.

“Go,” she urged, and Nia opened the door, pulling her along.

The Vatican was still seated on the cathedral steps. He had a couple people sitting below him, praying in silence. The square itself wasn’t deserted, but it was very empty for the time and the day of the week. It should have been busy, but there were only some people crossing the square, or huddling at café street tables, or loitering outside the _Press Current_ field office anxiously.

For a few seconds, no one noticed them, standing hand-in-hand at the top of Sankt Michelmarc’s stairs.

But then Segal Lang, the _Press Current_ ’s head correspondent for Jagdshall news, someone Nia was surprised to see hanging about in a hopeless miasma outside eir own office, looked over at the small prayer group and saw them.

_“JAGDSPRINZ!”_ ey shouted, and broke into a sprint for them. The entire square looked up, and there was a breathless, disbelieving silence that made Nia extremely uncomfortable. For a lack of anything really productive or helpful to do, she raised a hand in acknowledgement of their stares, putting on a brief smile that she hoped looked natural and pleased.

It was the right thing to do, or otherwise the people had just been waiting for her to do _anything,_ because the bang of the _Press Current_ ’s front doors as the other staff rushed inside was audible all the way across the square, and people at the street tables were ducking inside to yell the news to the waiters and cooks, and someone was running down the road that led to the foot of the mountain, likely to catch one of the trams and spread the news, and _Zio_ Cris stood and walked up the steps and cradled her face in his hands with a look of muted wonder.

“You live,” he said, and Nia let go of Odette’s hand to hug him. “You _live;_ thank God-”

“The Pict are dead, we’re safe,” she told him. “You can go home.”

He inhaled sharply, and pushed her back.

“Gilbert-”

“He’s fine,” Nia said. “I’m meeting with him, I asked Ivan to get him back to the Jagdshall. He should be there already.”

Cristoforo reached up to touch her face again, and then stepped himself away to the Jagdshall as Segal Lang mounted the steps.

“Your Majesty, let me say how relieved we all are to see you alive and well-”

“Yes, I know,” she interrupted em.

“Right, well,” ey said, catching eir breath from the sprint. “You haven’t been seen since Ereshkigal’s banishment of the Jagdsprinz in Kharad, and there’s been some wild speculation about your whereabouts and your reasons. What have been you been doing out of the public eye so long?”

“Dying,” Nia told em, because it was a nice brief answer that was even true. “Now you’re going to hate me, Segal, because I’m going to give you a lot of news points all at once and I’m not going to take the time to elaborate on any of them, I’m certain there will be releases and press statements later.”

“As you will, Your Majesty,” Segal said, fingers curled expectantly, ready to _‘type’_ out whatever she said in the imaginary keyboard grid that eir interface gloves would notice and store. “Whenever you’re ready.”

“The Pict are dead, the galaxy is safe, but Oskapus Jelea Trojana and Helike were overrun, the latter three with the evacuations still in progress, the fleets sustained appreciable losses and the Hunt staggering ones, we’ll be recruiting after a period of respectful mourning for our fallen, Empress Forouzandeh is dead, I’m meeting with General Beilschmidt and _Razanás Venexia_ soon to discuss and coordinate our short-term plans, and Ereshkigal is dead.”

Segal’s eyes were quite wide by the end of her list, but ey pressed on with another question as Nia eyed the square. It was a nice big space, and Odette had reached for hand again and was holding it tightly- her wife didn’t want to her leave, and she didn’t much want to leave Odette if she couldn’t leave her confident that she was coming back, that she wasn’t going to disappear or that she wasn’t imagining this.

“ _Razanás_ Nanshe refused to aid against the Pict-”

Wait, she didn’t know the details of this one-

The Jagdsprinz unobtrusively dropped everything it knew about the situation into her head, once again.

“It was petty of her and we will be having _words_ later,” Nia said, privately snarling in outrage at the Queen of the Ramman for her reasoning. She could _not_ have Maria and how _dare_ she throw such a- a _tantrum_ over this, when she’d _known_ that people were going to die if she didn’t help!

She prodded at the Jagdsprinz, asking a question with intent instead of words.

**Yes,** it told her.

“Segal, I’m not going to order you to leave,” Nia said. “Because this is going to be news too, but I have to ask you to move over.”

She squeezed Odette’s hand, and gave her a reassuring smile as she let go and stepped away.

This part of being Jagdsprinz she’d never done before. There hadn’t been reason to.

“I call Congress!” she called, loudly, clearly. The words boomed, heedless of the local acoustics. It was enough to carry naturally through the square, but she knew it went much further, straight to the ears of everyone who needed to hear it. “I call the Kings of Honalee!”

She referenced the Jagdsprinz’s memory of the meeting Amphitrite had called.  

“Lords of the Five Cities of Chicomoztoc and of the Seven _Tsergiin_ of Vörös Saikhan Tal, you are _called!_ Hrauketreig _Keda_ of Irvinrkallrene, you are _called!_ Ahbajit av Maduvati High Priest of the Turājada Dhineijan, you are _called!_ Afallach ap Llud Llaw Prince of the Silent Hills and the Tylwyth Teg, you are _called!_ ”

They came silently, the air at the base of stairs shimmering as the World Gate opened from multiple locations at once, delivering the Kings and those otherwise summoned.

Amphitrite was first, sweeping through in her trailing robes. Her shoulders and her expression dropped in relief when she saw Nia, and she smiled, coming to stand just below her. Arion and Kore Despoina were next, Arion mounting the stairs with a thundering clatter to nose at her and whicker. Nia petted him reassuringly, and Kore leaned close with worry written all over her face.

“János-”

“He’s fine,” Nia told her. “He’s coming back to the Jagdshall now.”

She sighed in relief, and sat down on the stairs. Arion laid down before the doors of the cathedral and snorted loudly.

Nicnevin and Afallach came next, and Odette flew down the stairs with her arms open, crying for the grandmother. Afallach shifted uncomfortably as Nia watched the three of them, wondering about the significance of them arriving together.

The others arrived with nods or smiles for her reappearance; though the Lords, whom she didn’t know, bowed low. So did the High Priest, but that was because the Turājada Dhineijan held her in extremely high respect, not because she didn’t know him.

Keda Hrauketrieg stalked up the cathedral steps to stand in front of her, and looked her over.

“Hiruz will be happy,” was all they said, with a bit of a grumble. “And the rest of the Irvinrkallrene as well, I suppose, and the Domdruc in general. They’ve gotten _attached._ ”

“I know what the Irvinrkallrene decided to do about the Hunt, if it had turned out I was definitely dead,” Nia told them. “And I thank you for the support you would have given them, and that you would have allowed them to stay.”

“Well,” the griffin said, tone huffy but pleased underneath that. “Like I said. They like you. You’re a republican. You respect us.”

“If this works out,” Nia told them, lowering her voice. “They _all_ will.”

Hrauketrieg’s eyes gleamed in sharp anticipation.

Nia counted heads, came up with everyone she’d expected to see, and sat down on the top step. The Kings and Lords and others arranged themselves on the stairs below, Odette next to her, twining their arms and leaning into her side.

“Ereshkigal is dead,” she said, simply, because there was no other way to do it. It had been a quiet, uneventful thing when it had been done; and trying to dress up the news of it would be dishonest, somehow.

The others sat frozen. There was an oddly electric, tense atmosphere about the stairs.

“It wasn’t me,” Nia told them. “The only thing I’ve killed today is the Pict.”

She looked over to Kore Despoina. She’d clenched her hands in her lap, and had a hard, resigned look in her eyes. She knew exactly who had gone after Ereshkigal.

“It was János Hederváry,” Nia said. “So we’ve a bit of a situation; because now something can be done about those who don’t want Kings.”

The Lords of the Five Cities of Chicomoztoc and the Seven _Tsergiin_ of Vörös Saikhan Tal looked very pleased, and straightened up.

“The question is- do you want _no_ Kings, or is the problem that there was only one position, and you’d rather _all_ be Kings?”

The Lords exchanged slightly uneasy, confused looks. They hadn’t thought of it like that. The Lords of the Five Cities turned into their own huddle to confer, but the _Tsergiin_ Lords looked to Ulandai, who crossed his arms and looked at Nia.

“What sort of a choice is _that?_ ” he asked. “This is the Congress of _Kings._ If we haven’t got at least one, we don’t have a place here.”

“Those were Ereshkigal’s rules,” Nia said. “And they were wrong. We don’t have to follow them. No one’s going to lose their place.”

“Everyone else will be outnumbered,” Kaschei Perun grumbled.

“I like how you assume the balance of probability is with the _Tsergiin_ unanimously agreeing to anything just because we all live in the same place,” Ulandai told him dryly. “You can claim your own people are so easily unified, then?”

“ _Mine_ certainly refuse to be,” Wángmŭ grumbled. “The regional rivalries they can create and cling to-”

Afallach shifted uncomfortably, and Nicnevin refused to look at him.

Hrauketrieg preened.

“ _We_ are unified,” they boasted.

Ulandai looked at Nia again.

“We stand by what I said before,” he told her. “Vörös Saikhan Tal has no King. We didn’t need one before Ereshkigal interfered, and we won’t need any now that she’s gone.”

“Well,” the Lord of Cíbola spoke up. “Each of our cities has taken a turn at having our King, and it worked out fine for us.”

“All right,” Nia said, and then thought at the Jagdsprinz: _How do we do this?_

**You have shifted power once before.**

_That was different, that was just Odette to Afallach. I don’t know how to do it here._

**I do.**

Nia stood, and went down the steps to where Ulandai was sitting. She could feel the Jagdsprinz stirring, and the air darkened a few shades as it half-manifested, just enough to be visible.

**“You would not have a King?”** they asked.

“No,” Ulandai answered for the other Lords.

They reached out and held Ulandai’s face, as Nia had Afallach’s centuries ago.

**“Then Vörös Saikhan Tal shall have no more Kings.”**

Ulandai shuddered all over as the power left him, but smiled widely once it was done, and they moved on to the Lords of the Five Cities, constraining the old King of Chicomoztoc to just his city, and creating the Lords’ new positions.

_You’re not leaving?_ Nia asked the Jagdsprinz, as they dropped their hand from the new King of La Canela.

**There are other rearrangements to be made,** it said, and nudged her attention towards them.

_Yes, okay, fine,_ Nia told it. _But it feels like I’d be intimidating them into it._

**Would she give it up if you did otherwise?**

_She might now. I don’t know._

**Does it bother you much?**

_Of course it does! For someone who said it had a particular insight into my mind and soul, you really-_

**It is still good to ask,** the Jagdsprinz said, and moved aside enough to let her speak on her own.

“Nicnevin,” Nia said.

The Queen of the Tylwyth Teg glared at her, stiff-lipped with every ounce of outrage and pride she could muster.

“They’ve never really liked you, Nicnevin,” Nia said. “And now they’re killing each other over it. Again. It’s time to step down.”

“I’m a good Queen for them,” Nicnevin insisted.

“They don’t care,” she told her. “They don’t like you.”

“It isn’t fair!”

“No, it isn’t,” Nia agreed. “You’ve done well enough with what you were given. But they want a King of Beli Mawr’s line, fully Tylwyth, and the only thing you had going for you, in their eyes, was that Ereshkigal had given it to you when your husband had to give it up. But now her word doesn’t carry any weight. The only people who are supporting you in this civil war are doing it out of a sense of tradition and duty! Even _they_ would rather have Afallach, but they care more about the social order!”

“You are _Jagdsprinz-_ ”

“Your people don’t want you and I can’t force them to accept you! I won’t give Jäger to suppress rebellion over something like this, and I won’t stand for _you_ trying to do the same! Your granddaughter gave up her position-”

“She shouldn’t have had to-”

**“Nicnevin ap Dyon Arthes, your people would rather _die_ than have you as their Queen!”**

Nicnevin flinched back.

Odette stood from her place at the top of the stairs and came down to kneel next to her.

“Grandmother,” she said quietly. “You have to. I had to, and now it’s your turn. It’s okay.”

“It isn’t _right!_ ” Nicnevin hissed.

“You can come stay with us,” Odette told her. “While things calm down. And if Afallach thinks it would work you could go back to Court-”

“I will not return in shame and disgrace!”

“There isn’t any,” Odette said. “Not in this. Letting Afallach be King won’t make them like you, Grandmother, but they won’t hate you for still being Queen.”

“I will not give in!”

_“Grandmother._ I swear, you’re just as stubborn as Nia. _Please._ If you won’t do it for your people, do it for yourself. Do it for me. You’re losing, and if you don’t let Afallach be King, they’ll kill you when they catch you so he _has_ to be King.”

“They will not catch me.”

“They will. _Please,_ Grandmother. They killed my parents for this already.”

Nicnevin looked at her, expression slowly changing from desperate anger to old sorrow.

Nia and the Jagdsprinz waited.

“I will still be Lady of Lavender’s Blue,” Nicnevin said, and Odette sighed in relief, very quietly.

“Yes, Grandmother,” she murmured. “Yes you will. No one can take that from you. You have that from your mother.”

**“You will not be Queen of the Tylwyth Teg, Nicnevin ap Dyon Arthes?”**

“Not now,” she answered them. Either she didn’t try to hide her bitterness, or there was too much of it to fully conceal. “No longer.”

**“Who would be King?”** they asked.

“I would be, Jagdsprinz,” Afallach said, repeating the set script they’d been through once before. The last time he had been cowed; now, he seemed nervous. “I would be King.”

They reached out and held his face.

**“Then I name you Afallach ap Llud Llaw, King of the Silent Hills and the Tylwyth Teg.”**

They turned away from the Tylwyth to look at Hrauketrieg and Ahbajit av Maduvati.

**“ _Keda._ High Priest.”**

“Yes, Jagdsprinz?” Ahbajit asked.

**“There are none to hold those with Kings over those without. The Domdruc and the Turājada Dhineijan will have a place in the Congress equal to any other.”**

There was a sputter of indignation.

**“Kaschei Perun, it is not your prerogative to call Congress; nor to summon any to it!”** they snapped at the King of Buyan. **“They are Honalenier, and they deserve their own voice.”**

“But _that_ is two votes for the Jägerskov!” Kaschei accused. “You are their King!”

“It’s an empty title,” Hrauketrieg told him. “It has been ever since Teufelmördor became Jagdsprinz! We make our own decisions.”

“Don’t try to pretend that she doesn’t have an overriding vote!”

_Shove off a minute,_ Nia told the Jagdsprinz. _He needs to hear from me, not you._

“I use it when, if the vote had gone further, I would have had to address it as Jagdsprinz,” she told him. “Otherwise I make suggestions. Whatever the Irvinrkallrene would say here for the Domdruc would be _their_ opinion and decision, not mine.”

She crossed her arms.

“When they don’t call me _‘Jagdsprinz’_ or _‘Teufelmördor’_ they call me _‘the Republican King’_. You really want to fight me on this, Kaschei?”

He grumbled, and glared a bit, but backed down.

“That’s all the business I had,” Nia told the group. “Does anyone else need anything?”

She waited a moment.

“No? Then I’ll see you all later.”

The World Gate opened again, and the Kings and others started to return home with the news of the Congress- but Nia saw that Nicnevin didn’t get up, and went to sit with her and Odette.

“You’re not going home?” she asked.

“Not yet,” Nicnevin said. “I will give Afallach time to- defuse the situation. Before I show myself.”

She didn’t sound happy about that at all, and Nia would bet that she was just repeating something Odette had convinced her to do.

“Sensible,” Nia said. “I- had a question, actually.”

“Really.”

“Did your husband ever say anything to you about what he thought he should be? As Jagdsprinz? What sort of a person he should be; how he was meant to do his duty?”

Nicnevin gave her an odd look; and Odette a significantly more worried one. Her wife reached for her hand.

“Nia?”

“I just,” she said. “I got yelled at, okay? About my personal failings.”

She was sure that Odette was going to press for more information on that later.

“I asked him why, after he came back and I was made Queen,” Nicnevin said. “He said that it was because _‘the law should be consistent, not absolute’_.”

Nia tried to puzzle that out- _‘absolute law’_ was the term legal scholars used to talk about _‘natural moral law’_ , things like not killing. But rules like that were a lot of what she enforced as Jagdsprinz.

And _‘consistent’-_ rule of law? But everyone _did_ fall under her ability to judge-

“A more modern way to phrase it,” Nicnevin continued, noting her struggle. “Might be: _‘Rule of law should be fair, not equal’_. Equal law, absolute law, is what we had- strict adherence to the letter and spirit of the law, in all ways and all cases, without acknowledgement for changing circumstances or bad decisions. The sort of unyielding divine law that your classical tragedies are based on.”

“But people get tricked,” Nia said, remembering some of those stories.

“If one wished to be particularly nasty, yes, you could remove someone you disliked that way,” Nicnevin said. “But it is more than that. Punishments need conscious guidance, because law is for conscious beings. We do not try to legislate for animals or plants, or the forces of nature. We only say what people can and cannot do with them, or to them. Gwyn- my husband-”

Maybe she should have waited to ask once the immediacy of having lost her husband’s first throne had worn off.

“Jagdsprinz Erlkönig believed that the enforcement of the law should never be less human than the people committing the crime.”

“You’re not him,” Odette spoke up. “You’re yourself. You don’t have to be like anyone else.”

“I know,” Nia said. “I don’t need to be anyone but myself. But I could be a better version of myself.”

“You’re a _good person,_ ” her wife told her. “You _are_ Nia, it doesn’t matter what mistakes you’ve made or if you could have made better decisions-”

“I know that,” Nia said. “But I should still be a better person. I _can_ be.”

She wasn’t entirely sure what her wife was making of this conversation, but there was a certain fire lighting in her eyes.

“We’re going to talk about this,” Odette said firmly. “But you need to talk to Amphitrite first.”

It was an odd change in direction. Nia looked around, and sure enough, Amphitrite hadn’t left. She was standing at the top of the stairs, lingering by the cathedral doors.

Nia got up to walk over, wondering what Amphitrite could want.

She felt the Jagdsprinz stir at the thought, but it provided no information. Rather, it felt a bit- _uncomfortable?_ Uneasy?

_What?_ Nia demanded.

**You will yell at me again,** it answered.

_Well maybe I don’t like-_

The Jagdsprinz dumped the information it had been withholding into her mind.

* * *

Maybe it was just a feeling, maybe it was tiny change in her grandmother’s expression, since it was in her line of sight and she’d been watching when it happened- but Nia reached out for the side of the cathedral, leaning heavily against the stone, and Odette was _there._

“Let’s go inside,” she said, making it not really a suggestion, taking Nia’s weight in a way that she hoped made it look like she was standing unassisted. Amphitrite noticed, at least, and Odette’s thoughts were stuck on _she said she didn’t think it could be healed_ as the other woman opened the cathedral door.

Odette let Nia sink to the floor in the narthex, and sank down in front of her. Nia had a thousand-yard stare that scared her quite a bit, but when she got into her spouse’s line of sight she refocused and that was _good._ Things couldn’t be that bad if she could pay attention to things.

“Nia?”

Her expression crumpled.

“The _children-!_ ”

She’d known about Honalee’s problems, and taken care of the Pict, but no one had said anything about the children? Odette could understand why no one would have wanted to bring it up- no, wait, but _Maria_ had been the one to go off with Nia, and they knew from Idunn that the only way Nia could have come back was with Maria’s help, so shouldn’t Nia have seen-

_Maybe there wasn’t anything to see,_ her thoughts whispered; and that was entirely too much hope, even with the Pict gone and Nia alive.

“Dette, _Dette,_ ” Nia said, grasping at her sleeves. “My _father._ Ahes wasn’t- _time travel-_ ”

No one had told her _anything,_ had they?

“I know, I know,” Odette said, tone soothing. “Nia- what happened? Are you all right?”

The small, faint shadows in the room deepened, and the Jagdsprinz curled around them. Odette started.

**She wondered why Amphitrite wished to speak with her,** the Jagdsprinz said. **So I informed her.**

“All at _once?_ Why didn’t you tell her earlier?”

**She needed to focus.**

The Jagdsprinz, in Odette’s opinion, needed some remedial socialization. She could have grabbed someone who’d never even _seen_ Nia in person, and they’d be able to tell it that having her father back would be major shock.

At least it was emotional shock, not physical or spiritual.

“It’s going to be all right,” Odette said.

“No it won’t,” Nia said. “No it _won’t_ they’re here but I’ll have to send them _back_ and Kêr-Is was _wrong_ and I don’t want to see my father and _Odette,_ the children just wanted us _happy,_ they weren’t trying to-”

She broke off and Odette pulled her into a hug, staring at the narthex wall as she sorted through what had been said.

“They were trying to make us happy?” she finally asked.

“It was a _test,_ ” Nia told her. “Reno tried one to make the news of the engagement go easier and then the others wanted a clear-cut experiment so they knew what he could do so they picked something so _incredibly_ unlikely that they’d know for sure it was magic doing it and- they _did_ think it out they picked something they thought would make things better and they put bounds on it but it wasn’t good enough-”

“It was an accident,” Amphitrite spoke up.

“795 million on Trojana, 2.53 billion on Jelea, 8.12 billion on Helike,” Nia said. “532,812 Jäger. 213,024 from the fleets.”

“Our children are not responsible for the Pict!”

“Fifteen in Kharad.”

That was quieter.

Odette heard Amphitrite take a deep breath.

“The demon Belial and Cassiel Navin,” she countered. “The demon freed the witch, and none of them summoned the demon.”

“Béutros Saab was forced.”

“You don’t know for certain!” Amphitrite insisted. “He’s dead! All he did was write a letter! You never saw him!”

  **I did,** the Jagdsprinz said.

“You also said that Ahes was a witch who tore apart souls and committed time travel!” she spat at it. “Am I to lose my children to the same _mistake?_ ”

The light darkened and the Jagdsprinz got bigger.

**I know what I know, Amphitrite Kataiis, and I see what I see; and I can see perfectly well that _your son_ tested unknown magic and that the bounds of the spell were fulfilled by Béutros Saab’s suffering!**

When Odette had been young, Honalenier didn’t argue with the Jagdsprinz. By the time she’d left the University, humans didn’t argue with the Jagdsprinz. By the time her parents had been killed, most of the Nations didn’t, either.

 Oh, the guilty argued sometimes, trying to save themselves. If they weren’t up against a Hunt proper, some of them fought. Most of them tried to run.

You didn’t argue with the Jagdsprinz because the Jagdsprinz was always right, because the Jagdsprinz was the Jagdsprinz and that’s what the Jagdsprinz _did._ The Jagdsprinz didn’t make mistakes.

Odette had thought that she’d left that mindset behind, because there wasn’t really anything else you could do when you knew Nia personally. She hadn’t thought that she still thought that the Jagdsprinz didn’t make mistakes, because she was _married_ to Nia, and she knew very well that Nia made mistakes.

But hearing Amphitrite challenge it, she realized that she’d just shifted it. Nia was the Jagdsprinz, yes- but there was Nia speaking as Nia, where she could be spectacularly full of mistakes; and then there was Nia speaking as Jagdsprinz Teufelmördor, where she was the Jagdsprinz and knew exactly what everyone had done wrong and so was the only person truly qualified to assign blame and mete out punishment, because why would you trust someone who could never really _know?_

“So you would see my children _dead,_ then?”

**Assigning punishment has never been my job,** the Jagdsprinz answered, settling again. **I provide the truth. Erlkönig, Teufelmörder- their part is the decision. I could show Teufelmördor a witch, and she could choose to let them live, even to leave them alone and let them wreak whatever damage they wished. It would cost her her respect and her authority, but I do not force her.**

It was Nia as Nia they would have to deal with here. The Jagdsprinz could attest to death; but it was Nia who would have to answer just how much of that death was the fault of the children- just Béutros Saab, only Kharad, the entire war?- and to what degree. The children hadn’t meant for anyone to die, so Odette could be confident that it wouldn’t be called _‘murder’,_ whatever else. It wouldn’t be voluntary manslaughter, there were no crimes of passion here.

But was what the children had done an accident, or involuntary manslaughter, the worst case of criminal negligence on record?

Odette would be happy to never find out, because she had a horrible feeling that it didn’t really matter, in the end. Nia was absolutely devoted to her duty, and if any of it had been their fault- the children had been warned once already, had been under watch for witchcraft as much as for their own protection.

She didn’t want to see her children dead.

“I don’t want to,” Nia whispered, hands tightening on the back of Odette’s shirt, and she wondered if her spouse had meant to speak aloud.

“What are you going to do to my _children?_ ”

Odette couldn’t turn with Nia clutching at her like this, but she did her best to look over her shoulder at the Queen.

“Amphitrite, _please,_ ” she asked. “She just found out.”

“I have been left with a High Command unwilling to make any move but forbid me from seeing my arrested children, Odette!” Amphitrite snapped. “At least _you_ have been in the same building, have seen them-”

“I haven’t,” Odette told her, feeling a renewed wash of guilt as she admitted it. “They didn’t tell me I couldn’t. But I’ve been down the hall from them for _weeks,_ and I can’t make myself go see my children.”

She was scared of trying to see them and being turned away. She was scared of being allowed to, and then not being able to give them any comfort. She was scared of seeing them and then losing them. She was scared of seeing them and then not being able to let them go. She was scared of seeing them and losing what little self-control and resolve she’d been able to cling to, and spiriting them off, making all of them fugitives and criminals without doubt.

She felt filthy inside. They were her children, and she was caught between warring ideals of the mother who sacrificed everything and the person who would never do something so wrong as stand against the Hunt.

It was wrong to stand against the Hunt, but she didn’t know what she’d do if she lost her children.

Almost worse was that she had yet another part of her that looked at the guilt over not self-sacrificing because of a mother’s love for her children and declared that it was a destructive, harmful ideal that shouldn’t be given an ounce of respect; and she didn’t know how she felt about it.  

“Sebastian and Nadri,” Nia said.

“What?” Odette asked, not understanding why her spouse would bring them up, specifically.

“Maria,” Nia said. “Reno. They- Mosè arrested him, wanted to get her. Sebastian never got arrested. The worst he did was encourage Reno. He’s not really involved in this, he’s just been staying in the rooms out of solidarity.”

This whole month she’d thought that Sebastian was going to die. Sebastian had been staying in the rooms with Reno and Nadri, the children always did everything together- she’d had no reason not to assume that Sebastian was automatically a part of this.

Except Nadri had only been confined when she’d threatened the Hunt, hadn’t she?

She should have thought about this, should have gone to see her son; what sort of things was he _thinking_ of her now, that she’d left him like this-

Nia shifted from clutching to hugging, and Odette let herself sag. Her spouse had gotten control of herself, and now she needed some of that support in turn.

“And Nadri?” she heard Amphitrite ask, her voice tight.

“It’s never been standard procedure to deny family access,” Nia told her. “Or arrest distraught family members. We’ve had people yell and threaten before, but it’s not grounds for detainment. We’re only concerned if they _do_ something. High Command was being overcautious in my- absence. Nadri should have been at home, not kept in the Jagdshall.”

 “You’re just going to let her go?”

Amphitrite was on guard now, suspicious- no reason to be, but Odette understood. If she hadn’t known Nia so well, she might not have trusted the news of Sebastian after so much time fearing a decision, either.

“Amphitrite Kataiis-”

Oh, this was going to be a _formal_ statement.

“-so long as your daughter does not commit any witchcraft or similar criminal offense, or attack me or my Jäger for the death of her brother, I give you my promise that I will give no orders for her death. She is free from this investigation.”

There was silence for a moment, then:

“Reno _will_ die, then?”

Nia sighed.

“Amphitrite, please,” she pleaded, voice quiet, and Odette got in closer, trying to convey comfort and support. “I can’t do this right now. I really can’t. Please, leave it be for now.”

Odette could well imagine that the Queen of Polí Thálassas was not pleased with that, and had a clear image of what her expression likely was.

“Very well.”

“I called Venice and the General for a meeting in the Jagdshall about what to do now,” Nia told her. “They should both be there by now. You could go up and tell Venice- and get Nadri, see Reno. I’ll send word ahead of you.”

“You won’t deliver the news yourself?”

“I,” Nia said, and Odette was close enough now that she could feel the stiffness in her shoulders as her thoughts circled back around to who else, exactly, was also in the Jagdshall. “I need more time. A bit. Before I can be in a room with them, and focus on a meeting.”

“Understandable.”

A pause.

“Thank you, Jagdsprinz.”

**I have done nothing here,** the Jagdsprinz complained, and Odette smiled a little when Nia crossly muttered: _“Oh, get lost already.”_ **It was Teufelmördor.**

“Then thank you- Nia.”

“Amphitrite?” Odette called as she heard the Queen start for the door. “If you would? Take my grandmother with you to the Jagdshall? I- should be here.”

_With Nia,_ she didn’t say, but they all knew.

“We can have something arranged to take Grandmother back home once the Hills have settled.”

“I will,” Amphitrite said.

“Thank you.”

One of the cathedral doors opened, then closed again. Odette straightened up after a few seconds of the quiet after the loud metallic _click_ of the door latch resettling, though she stayed leaning in Nia’s shoulder.

“Jacques?” Nia asked the air, and Martinach’s AI materialized in front of them out of the wireless to show that he was listening. “Could you tell Marschall Braginski and that Sebastian and Nadri are not complicit in the- _mess_ Reno and Maria are in and are free to leave? Also that Venice and Queen Kataiis _are_ allowed to visit their son.”

“And Grandmother,” Odette prompted.

“And then Untermarschall Agresta that Lady Nicnevin ap Dyon Arthes will need an escort to Lavender’s Blue in a few hours. _Drakräder_. Ah- Leutnant Micchichelo and Kommandant Filfaraskind for preference, and anyone else they need, to show we _really_ mean it.”

“Leutnant Miccichelo is on medical leave,” Jacques said.

“What? Why-”

“I’ll tell you,” Odette told her. “Thank you, Jacques.”

The AI blinked out of existence.

“So what did Emma do _this_ time?” Nia asked. “She pulls a lot of stunts if you give her the chance, but usually she doesn’t seriously hurt herself doing it.”

“She killed Cassiel Navin,” Odette said.

_“Really?”_

“All by herself,” Odette added. “She let him stab her with the long _Drakräder_ knife right through the abdomen and yanked back harder than he did when he tried to get magic from her death. She tore all the magic right out of him and then shot him in the head, point blank range.”

“Oh for God’s sake,” Nia half-moaned. “ _Emma._ Tell me Ivan’s already yelled at her for reckless self-endangerment.”

“It worked,” Odette pointed out. “And being willing to die in the line of duty is part of her job.”

“Yes, but most of my Jäger don’t keep rushing into situations with a high probability of death! They at least show up with a squad!”

“Nia, it was a demon-infested house and we were almost certain there was an escaped _Seelenkind_ witch in there with you. What _possible_ situation would she have been more pleased to rush into?”

Nia frowned.

“War with the Pict,” she said. “I’m glad she _was_ on medical leave. If she wasn’t, she would have been down on-”

She stopped and her face took on a look of concentration. It was a Nation’s consulting look, Odette realized, and noted that the Jagdsprinz had disappeared at some point.

They had to be talking. She’d have to get used to this.

“Oskapus,” Nia continued. “With Nico and the others, and she’d be dead right now. I can’t _believe_ her, but I like her alive. How bad was it?”

A month was a very long time, in this day and age, for medical leave.

 “She was unconscious in the hospital for four days while they managed to keep her alive,” Odette told her. “Then she was in a wheelchair for three and a half weeks while they forced her gut and lower back to heal enough to stop worrying so much about tearing or infection. She’s been allowed to walk around for a few days now, but I hear she keeps sitting down when she thinks no one’s paying attention. She was helping hold quarantine in Prarayer, but she hijacked Arik’s office once he left with the fleet and staged a temporary coup in Intelligence and Internal Affairs. Diana mentioned it.”

“Quarantine in Prarayer?”

“Our time-displaced guests,” Odette said, watching Nia for a reaction- part of the point of this conversation had been to give her a distraction from thoughts of her father and siblings while she adjusted. “They were under Colony Rules to prevent them spreading any bacteria or viruses they brought with them, to get them vaccines for what we have now, monitor any allergic reactions to new foods or substances, get them acquainted with some history basics-”

Nia’s breathing stuttered.

“So they- they know-”

“Nico brought them back from Kharad,” Odette told her gently. “He wasn’t in a good way, Nia. They started asking questions, and- he handed them the book and left. It could have been handled better, but it saved uncomfortable conversations. Don’t yell at him, he felt bad enough on his own.”

“I wasn’t going to,” Nia said. “That’s- good. Good. They deserve to know. I-”

She didn’t finish that, but Odette knew what she would have said.

_I’m glad I don’t have to tell it myself._

It was time to change the subject.

“So,” she asked. “Are we just going to sit here? It would be rude to monopolize the cathedral. It’s a public space.”

“Yes, right,” Nia said. “Let’s go back- that shawl needs to go away.”

“I’m glad I don’t need it,” Odette told her as she helped her to her feet. She kissed Nia briefly when they were both standing, and then Nia stepped them to their rooms in the Jagdshall. Odette handed over Nia’s rosary and Bible, making sure to remove the drafted statement she’d no longer need from the book. _That_ she put on her vanity to take down to the offices later- to shred or file for the archives, she wasn’t sure yet- and started unloading the gold hairpins and clips from her pockets.

“Oh,” she heard Nia say, and Odette looked at her reflection in the mirror. Her spouse was staring through the closet doors she’d left open earlier, when she’d retrieved the shawl.

“What?”

“I just realized that I’ve been wearing this armor for a month straight.”

Odette wrinkled her nose in disgust and turned around.

“Get out of that and go take a shower,” she ordered, pointing to the bathroom. “Brush your teeth, brush your hair, get a new dress uniform- you’ll go to that meeting with Venice and the General _clean._ ”

Nia gave her a little smile and dismissed her armor. Then her expression twisted.

“I _smell._ ”

“That’s what happens when you don’t change your clothes,” Odette told her. “No, don’t take your boots off out here, do it in the bathroom. Leave your clothes out in there too- steam will do them some good. They’ll just stink up the hamper if you throw them in there now.”

Nia left off removing her clothes and went to the bathroom, shutting the door behind her.

“And use the toilet!” Odette called after her. “If it’s been a month, then you’ve just gotten used to ignoring it!”

There was a sharp, wood-muffled word in response to that.

“And I want _food!_ ” Nia complained loudly enough to be heard clearly through the door.

“After you’re clean and presentable!”

Odette waited until she heard the shower start to run before she went to put the shawl away, and paused in the closet with the top of the chest she kept her few clothes from her days at the Tylwyth Court open. The shawl went with the mourning robes she’d worn for her parents’ funeral, fine undyed wool, loose and soft when she’d first worn it, but now creased with age and smelling strongly of wood.

She dropped the shawl on the floor and lifted the mourning robes out of the chest, handling them more carefully. Mourning robes were _meant_ to fall apart as part of the process of grief, and the old tradition was that the period of mourning was only over once the robes had completely come apart. But handled gently- and with judicious application of magic- they could be held together indefinitely. Odette hadn’t considered herself in mourning for her parents for a long time, but she didn’t want to lose what she had left of the funeral, either.

The mourning clothes had been held in a tray, and she lifted it out to reveal the nest of jewels underneath.

It had been a long time she’d looked at the crown jewels her grandmother had pressed her to keep. The Tylwyth had had the proper accruements for a ruling King and a Prince or Princess, but nothing for an adult third-in-line who needed to put on the proper show, so her grandmother had commissioned some.

Odette would have left them at Court for Afallach’s potential children- that he _still_ didn’t have- but her grandmother had insisted. They’d been made for her, and she’d never get to wear the Princess’s crown jewels, so she should keep what she’d managed to have.

Her grandmother had ever been stubborn about the prerogatives of royalty and status, in a way that Odette’s father never had been, and she herself hadn’t been in her early years; but she’d learned and understood, now. Nicnevin and Odile hadn’t been born assured of their positions, and fought for the power they’d had every day of their lives, for the security she’d never had to doubt in the same ways.

Her mother had been killed for her power; and today, her grandmother had finally lost her own fight.

And here _she_ was, an Empress, wife of the Jagdsprinz, loved and respected and unchallenged, graced with some unthinkable favor by the universe that had returned Nia to her, even if not as well as she’d been before.

Odette looked up at the open alcove over to her side, where her state robes for the really formal events at Prarayer hung free to preserve the silk and furs and lace. They weren’t the same ones as Liesl’s, not like the kokoshnik tiara and matching jewelry set, but they were still similar.

There would have to be at least one press conference today, about the Pict and to show off Nia and to act like they’d always had things under control, and she’d have to be there, as Empress. Nia would likely show up in her armor, and Odette would have to match her with the state robes.

But it didn’t feel quite right, sitting here, looking at what was left of her time at the Tylwyth Court and thinking of her grandmother’s forced abdication, to just put on the state robes and smile.

She looked at the state robes again, the dark red Kūnlún silk and Jägerskovsk fur trim and gold-thread Tylwyth lace, and rooted around in the chest.

Odette was sitting in front of her vanity again, brushing out her hair to put it back up, when Nia came out of the bathroom. She saw the door open and steam waft out ahead of Nia exiting in towels, getting water on the carpet as she dumped her old clothes in the hamper, possibly never to be seen again if they couldn’t be fully cleaned.

“You’re dressed up?” Nia asked, seeing her at the vanity. She’d put on the state robes before sitting down.

“We’ll have to hold a press conference later,” Odette told her. “And even if someone else gets delegated to give the statements, we’ll have to put on an appearance. We just won against the Pict, Ereshkigal is dead, and the Hills’ civil war is over. As many people who died today, this is a time to celebrate, too. We should look like it.”

Nia nodded absently and disappeared into the closet, emerging a few minutes later in dress uniform, minus boots and belt and weapons, hair still wrapped up in a towel to leech out as much water as possible. The other wet towel was hung over the bathroom door to dry, and Nia came over. Unasked, and without an exchange of words, she took the hairbrush from Odette at the beginning of a new stroke and continued the work as Odette sorted through her pins and clips, deciding on a style for the rest of the day.

“So,” Nia said. “My. My father.”

“He’s been asking about you,” Odette said. “I’m sure Emma told him the most, since she’s been staying with them, but I don’t know specifics. Nico has been over a couple of times to see his parents, maybe he answered some questions as well. I do know that Ivan made a trip recently, and talked you up the way he does.”

“So he got intense and probably called me _‘tsar’_ to _Vati_ ’s face.”

Odette shifted the pins and clips she wouldn’t need into a vanity drawer and met Nia’s eyes in the mirror, silently asking if she wanted to talk about the tone she’d said that in.

“I’m an emperor,” Nia said. “He didn’t have the best experience with the idea of empire, there’s democracy on the local level but this is really an autocracy, and I have _Ivan_ as one of my closest friends and trusted seconds-in-command. I trust him with government, I trust him with civilians, he’s in law enforcement- you never knew him as Russia. I didn’t really either, but I grew up on stories, and-”

“As much as Diana loves it when you think about your image,” Odette interrupted her gently. “She’d be right along with me and Nico and Ivan and Lord Hiruz and Mosè and Arik and everyone else in telling you that if he can’t take a look at the facts and see that what _you_ have done is nothing like that, he doesn’t deserve the level of esteem you hold him in.”

“But what if I only _think_ that it’s not that-”

“Nia,” she said firmly. “You remember what it was like trying to get the humans to understand the Honalenier mindset about the Hunt back when you were starting out, don’t you? This is the same problem. The Nations know my grandfather’s Hunt, and the only frame of reference your siblings and cousins have is-”

“Military dictatorships?” Nia asked, tone tinged with bitterness. “Secret police states? Puppet governments? The level of power and authority the Hunt has, the reach and breadth of our influence, the _entirety_ of Intelligence and Internal Affairs- there’s very little we can’t find out and no one we can’t investigate. The Hunt supersedes every law and dictate and regulation, so long as it’s in the fulfilment of our duty. No one thinks it’s wrong, and no one protests.”

“And when the Republican Confederacy said they didn’t want Jäger integrated into their police, you argued treaty terms and had meetings here to come up with alternatives,” Odette said. “You don’t collect information to ruin your political enemies or destroy people or groups you just don’t like. The information Arik and his people collect is extensive and exhaustive so that you can try to catch problems before they happen, or at least as they happen; and failing that, to extract justice. This _isn’t_ like that. That’s not what you’re doing.”

“Good intentions and prior good conduct don’t mean anything once you’ve fucked up once.”

Odette reached up and grabbed her hands, stopping her brushing.

“And you _haven’t_ done that,” she reminded her. “And you won’t make a mistake like _that,_ because it isn’t something you can just stumble into. It has to be a choice, and we’d hear of it, because you couldn’t do it all on your own, and then we’d stop you. You need to leave it be, Nia.”

Her spouse started brushing again, in silence, and Odette let her finish. Nia handed the brush back when she was done.

“But if _they_ think-”

_“Nia,”_ Odette cut her off, picking out the first handful of hair to be put up. “You could just _not tell them._ They won’t know everything Arik does unless _you_ tell them, because no one has any reason to bring it up.”

“But-”

“Hold this,” Odette ordered her, pulling her handful of hair back. Nia took it so it could be pinned in place. “Sometimes, Nia, I think that you _want_ people to hate you for what you do. Is this twenty-first century moral guilt, anxiety about your father, or feeling too pressured by your own sense of responsibility?”

“High Command doesn’t know me so well,” Nia said, twisting a section of hair. “If they just- I _know_ I can’t never make a mistake, but if I just _failed_ already-”

“You’d hate going through everyone tearing you apart, and then you’d worry about getting your reputation back, and you’d wish it never happened.”

She had to wave Nia off for the next part, where she gathered the top layer of her hair into a draping fan high on the back of her head with her largest clip. Nia helped her fold the hanging ends into a thick roll at the nape of her neck with the middle layer of hair, and pinned it in place as Odette inserted the heavily-jeweled combs she’d taken from her chest at the sides of the fan.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve seen those,” Nia remarked as she pinned. “Are you wearing the rest of it too?”

“I was thinking about Grandmother,” Odette told her, and it was all that needed to be said. Nia could fill in the rest of the train of reasoning. “Bottom layer, gathering braid.”

That was the simplest part of the style, but it was very hard to start a braid halfway down your back. Tylwyth ladies’ best-paid handmaids were their hairstylists for a reason, and Nia had to actually sit down on the floor to make doing the foot-long braid easier. Odette passed down the appropriate clasp to hold the end of it in place, then clipped the ends of the multiple gathered strands of sapphire and citrine beads into her hair, hiding the clips under the base of the fan and just behind where her tiara would sit.

“They just want you back,” she told Nia as she carefully arranged her tiara. It was a heavy thing, with long panels of rock crystal carved with the running Tylwyth horse set in the gold frame, panels flanking a burst of citrine around a large central sapphire. “For the last month, your father has felt the same way about you that you’ve felt about him. If there _are_ going to be any problems with them, it won’t be today. Or even tomorrow, or the day after.”

Nia sighed, and Odette stood and tugged the towel off her spouse’s hair.

“It’ll dry faster if you brush it out,” she told her. “I’ll have food sent down to you in your meeting. Venice and the General can wait, but if you leave it much longer they’ll think you’re purposefully snubbing them.”

“That’s _not_ what I-!”

Odette had been going to put the towel back in the bathroom, but the virulence of Nia’s exclamation stopped her in surprise. Nia was attacking her hair with her own brush, trying to get enough of the water out to keep from looking damp and dripping.

“Nia?”

“I’m going to _apologize_ today!” she said. “Can you get my boots?”

That was… not why Odette had thought the meeting had been called.

“Is it because your father’s here?”

“ _No,_ I got yelled at by the Jagdsprinz and people have been telling me for _centuries_ to let it go but that was just the last-”

She stopped.

“Oh no, _they’re_ going to think that’s why I’m doing this, aren’t they?” she said. “That’s not- I’m not doing it because of _Vati_!”

“Well, you _started_ it because of him-”

“No! Well, _yes,_ but-”

Nia smacked the brush down on the vanity and went for her sword and shoulder holsters, left on the bed. Odette grabbed her spouse’s boots when she put the towel back.

“But what?” she asked when Nia tried to take the boots, holding them out of her reach.

“But it stopped being about that a long time ago, and what it’s _really_ been about was- I’ve been a massive hypocrite, Odette, and I’ve decided that today is the day I stop.”

She handed over her boots.

“Good.”

* * *

Things in the War Room had descended into uneasy quiet waiting once Feliks had disappeared. Erzsébet and Roderich were just sitting there are the table, staring at each other in some sort of mute shock. Norway had closed off completely and retreated to a corner, his usual non-expression badly disguising a hard tension. England had taken a stack of books from the shelves in languages he knew and was flipping through them seemingly at random, sometimes stopping to read part of a page before ignoring whole chapters, or going back to a section he’d already bypassed, or switching to another text entirely.

The children were clumped on the other side of the room around the bookshelves, keeping a slightly hurtful distance from the rest of them. That wasn’t new at least- they’d drawn away a lot since they’d first arrived, perhaps trying to cope with the future or about how things had gone or both or something else- who knew, they weren’t talking to any of their parents.

Over by the door, Kiku was sitting quietly next to Ludwig, who’d sunk back into his miserable silence now that enough time had passed from whatever fight he’d had with Feli.

Lovino was still conflicted about it. His first instinct was to jump to Feli’s defense, but it had been Ludwig with the raised voice out in that hallway, and he knew that his brother-in-law had grounds for a lot louder, longer, and angrier yelling session than that.

But he didn’t know where Feli was and he was already mad about being left alone, _ignored,_ for _a whole fucking month_ but it was the sort of mad that could turn into crying and hugs as soon as they were in the same room together. That wasn’t how he _wanted_ to feel, and everything was frustrating and that was yet another reason to be angry, so he was cooking.

Antonio and Francis were only getting in the way. There wasn’t quite enough room for three people in the War Room’s kitchen area, but they had a lot of people to make food for and not a large variety of ingredients to work with, so he was tolerating them. They had no idea if any of them were going to get fed since everyone was occupied with the Pict, so the safest bet was just to take care of it themselves.

And it was familiar, comforting, to be in a kitchen doing what he knew and muttering insults at Antonio and the food and the kitchen utensils and the world in general while handling a sharp knife and shutting things in with a fire hot enough to kill a man. The smells were right, the feeling was right, Antonio humming absently as he worked around him was right, even Francis and his stupid meddling face and sub-par culinary skills and standing non-invitation to just turn up whenever he liked was right.

He fell into the rhythm of it so easily, seduced by the illusion of normalcy, that he had no idea how long Nico had been huddled in the corner of the line of cabinets that blocked off the kitchen area before he actually noticed his son there.

Lovino put the pot he’d been about to use on the counter and dropped to his knees on the floor next to him. Nico had his knees drawn up and was hugging them, head down.

“Nico-”

“I don’t want to _talk_ about it, _Padre_ ,” he said, voice muffled against his pants.

Lovino grasped his shoulders, trying to be comforting, trying to lend support.

“It’s going to be all right,” he said. “It’s battle shock. It’ll pass and your _Papà_ and I will be here-”

“That’s not it!” Nico exclaimed. It sounded like he was crying- and hysteria? Yes, just getting there. “That’s not it! I’ve killed people before, that doesn’t bother me! That’s part of my _job!_ ”

Lovino swallowed his words- killing people didn’t _bother_ Nico? It didn’t bother _him,_ but that was desensitization, the built-up callousness of centuries, and even then it was only if they were trying to kill him or they deserved it or it had to be done. It was _meant_ to be different for people who weren’t Nations. They were _supposed_ to feel bad about it.

Antonio had joined him on the floor.

“Nico?” he asked gently. “The Pict?”

“It’s over, it’s done, they’re all dead, there was-”

Nico lifted his head from his knees and tried to stand up, but he couldn’t seem to coordinate himself. Shock, definitely. A bad case of post-battle nerves. Sleep and someplace warm and safe, heavy food with sugar and salt and other things to trigger neurochemicals that could balance out the adrenaline crash a bit- that was what he needed, not to be sitting on tile thinking himself into a panic.

“-Germany’s here right, Zell and Heinrich-”

“Yes, yes,” Antonio said soothingly, and helped him off the floor. Lovino got up as well, trying to think of something simple and comforting he cook quickly.

Nico leaned forward against the countertop, facing the table, bracing himself on his arms.

“Nia’s not dead,” he told Ludwig. “She came back and destroyed the Pict, they’re all dead- she’s not dead-”

His voice was getting thinner, slightly higher.

“-but she’s _supposed_ to be dead she shouldn’t have survived that but she’s _not dead-_ ”

Nico’s voice cracked there, and Antonio got a steadying hand on his back before Lovino could make a move to do anything.

“It’s supposed to have _limits,_ isn’t it?” his son asked England. “There are supposed to be things magic can’t do, aren’t there, things we _shouldn’t_ be able to do we thought we had them figured out but things keep _happening-_ ”

It wasn’t asking, Lovino realized. Nico was begging for an answer that would make the world steady again.

“-they just, they just-”

He was staring at his hands like they weren’t a part of him, like they were a nightmare.

“-I pushed myself to my limits and they _weren’t there-_ ”

“Nico?” Antonio asked. “Please, what happened?”

“I was- it was part of the plan, we were going to trap the Pict on one planet, but it- when I was talking to Ahes she asked me how thoroughly I could destroy something and- I was just trying to get them away from _right there_ but-”

_“Nico,”_ Lovino said firmly, trying to sound stern. Sometimes this worked for soldiers; hopefully it could work for his son. “One sentence summary.”

“I put the entire surface of a planet through nuclear fission and I _wasn’t even trying hard._ ”

All coherent thought disappeared as he tried to imagine that, tried to _comprehend_ that. It was just- a whole planet was too big, too much.

Nico shuddered all over and bent forward over his arms.

“I wasn’t trying,” he whimpered. “It wasn’t any more effort than I usually do I was just _thinking_ about it a little different than usual _we’re not supposed to be able to **do this-** ”_

“Did you-”

Antonio was trying to say something, but it wouldn’t come out.

“How many people are dead?”

“Just the Pict,” Nico said. “Just the Pict but it’s _too much_ if magic’s really just about _thinking_ about it right if Lana was more right than we ever thought then where does it _end_ what’s stopping us from doing _anything_ there should be limits _everyone else has limits!_ ”

There had to be _something-_

“Sebastian just rearranged a soul and Maria made an _entire universe on **accident**_ and Reno made all _this_ and Nia’s not dead and János is going after Ereshkigal-”

“He,” Antonio said, and no their son didn’t need to hear this right now! “He did it. Feliks came by.”

“-János _killed Ereshkigal_ and I could have, I could have _blown up Oskapus_ and that’s not _right!_ That shouldn’t be _allowed!_ If we can just _ignore_ the rules the rest of magic follows if we can just _do things_ with barely thinking about it with _not thinking about it_ then _what are we? Lana_ was never this powerful! _Øystein_ was never this powerful. _Cassiel-_ ”

Lovino didn’t know how Nico was still standing at this point. His knees were bent like his legs had given out, but he was still half on the counter.

_“Cassiel,”_ Nico gasped. “ _Cassiel_ could have- the things that _could have happened_ if we hadn’t-”

“It’s the past now,” Lovino told him, because he couldn’t just stand here any longer and feel useless. “It didn’t-”

_“It could have,”_ Nico said, and he sounded like he was going to be sick. “Oh God it _could have;_ the _only other person_ who could _ever_ do things like this who could _ever_ just _change the universe_ like this is- was- it was _Ereshkigal_ and János _killed her_ if we’re like Ereshkigal then _what does that make us? What **are** we? **What are we!** ”_

* * *

There were a couple of things that Gilbert was trying very hard not to think about, which of course meant he _was_ thinking about them, because this meeting Nia wanted was still not happening and the only other person in this room was Feliciano now that Nico had gone off to do Jäger things, which- no. He was _not_ talking to Feliciano, not until Ludwig asked him to or Feliciano actually started proving he was taking some concrete responsibility about apologizing.

Until then, they could just continue not talking, which meant that the only thing for him to do was stew and worry about things like, oh, who was actually running the largest political unit of the galaxy at the moment, since Helike had fallen.

He had an awful suspicion that _no one_ was, in fact, running it; and that it was only holding together because everyone was too scared to think otherwise. Close on the heels of that thought was an even _worse_ suspicion that they were going to make _him_ run it.

Gilbert _liked_ the army and the police- even if this very short, very damaging war had exposed a major flaw that meant he’d have to completely reorganize it- and being in charge of the spies. He’d gotten pretty good at it, and this was the closest he’d get to the sort of excitement that really made life worth _living._ Countries were fun up until the point where you were the one running the whole thing, instead of just the parts you liked. Someone who honestly enjoyed the modern state of politics, or could at least tolerate it, should be the one in charge.

Not him. _Absolutely_ not him.

But the problem was that there were very few other people who _could_ do it. There weren’t any surplus Nations hanging around, picking one from the constituent planets would just be _asking_ for trouble, Artakshathra and Don were AIs and that could get strange, and getting a human into the position would be one hell of a fight.

Well- on the other hand, that could be something to do. He liked a good fight, it wouldn’t necessarily be a bad idea to remind Humanity Imperial that humanity was capable of administering at the highest level of government.

Nia had better turn up soon, otherwise he’d have no option but to start plotting a way to get Antonie Kalananka appointed Emperor.

He’d started putting some effort into it- _Step One, track down where Kalananka had gone; Step Two, set up a temporary capital; Step Three, gather the remnants of the legislative and executive; Step Four, duumvirate or triumvirate, either way consolidate power-_ when someone else finally turned up in the Court Gallery.

Not Nia- what was _taking_ her- but Gilbert would happily trade putting the meeting some more for Cristoforo’s company.

Even if he was doing worrying things, like completely abandoning his composure and running, _actually running,_ towards him for a hug.

“Hey,” he said, bracing himself against the impact of the hug. “Hey, woah, I’m okay-”

It had been a very long time- no, had this _ever_ happened? Cristoforo didn’t go to people for support or comfort. That was what other people came to _him_ for. And the few times anyone had managed to get him to talk about his own problems without deflecting, it was a grave, solemn thing. Yet here he was, clutching at the back of Gilbert’s jacket with his face buried in his shoulder and breathing in a not-going-to-cry way.

“You’re alive,” Cristoforo said. “You came back.”

“‘Course I am, Kit. Had people to come back to.”

No need to say anything about how he’d been pretty sure that he _was_ about to die there for a minute; or that he definitely would have been by now if Nia hadn’t pulled off her improbable here-comes-the-cavalry resurrection. Cristoforo already knew, and if he wasn’t thinking about it right now, he didn’t want to remind him about it.

“That does not,” Cristoforo told him, grip relaxing just a bit. “Assure that you will return.”

“Doesn’t it?” Gilbert asked, pulling back enough so that his crooked smile was visible. That always worked on Cristoforo. “It’s worked out pretty damn well for me so far. Miraculously, even.”

“Just because your single-minded stubbornness about refusing to die so you could be there for your brother worked _once-_ ”

“It only needed to work once,” Gilbert said. “That was the important time.”

“The important time,” Cristoforo echoed in a mumble, and Gilbert considered the pros and cons of kissing him in front of Feliciano. Pros: kissing, Cristoforo, potentially shocking the hell out of Feliciano, private satisfaction of proving that between the two of them _he_ was the one with the healthier and more functioning relationship. Cons: Feliciano totally missing the interpersonal politics of the situation and just being _happy for them,_ which was actually sort of a pro, which made it a con for being contrary like that _._

“Yes.”

“Hm?”

“I have spent the entire day praying,” Cristoforo said. “Mostly for you. I wanted the galaxy safe, yes, but more than that I wanted you to _come home._ I- I do need you. I spoke to His Holiness. He was… unhelpful, but today he entrusted me with the entirety of the Church. I have no doubt that he would do so again, or that it would not have been accepted. I am certain that this is where God wants me. That is worth much more than any vows I may or may not be held to, especially in the face of a true gift and a fulfillment of a sacrament.”

“Wait a second,” Gilbert said, even though he didn’t really _need_ that second, he knew what Cristoforo was saying. “Wait a second that was a _that_ sort of _‘yes’_ -”

“Yes.”

“Holy shit!”

_“Gilbert.”_

“Sorry,” he said, holding Cristoforo tighter, even though he wasn’t, really. “Sorry, sorry, I just- _Kit-_ I mean I _asked_ but even then I wasn’t expecting- I know how things are-”

“Were.”

“Were,” Gilbert repeated, savoring the sound and meaning of it. “Yeah. How they _were._ ”

This was- this was _awesome._

“Cristoforo?” Feliciano asked. “What’s going _on?_ ”

“Gilbert and I,” Cristoforo answered him, not looking away from Gilbert’s brilliant, recklessly joyful smile. “Are finally getting married.”

_“Cristoforo!”_ Feliciano exclaimed, and okay, he was ignoring that his own relationships were a wreck but that really didn’t matter as much as it had a minute ago. Gilbert could gladly live with that right now because _Kit had said yes._ “Oh oh oh oh oh oh _Cristoforo!_ Cristino you’re getting _married_ oh I’m so happy for you, I’m so glad you get to, it’s such a wonderful thing-”

If he hadn’t just had his proposal accepted, Gilbert would have _punched him._

“I know, Feliciano,” was all Cristoforo said, because he was much more forgiving person. “I am very happy for me as well.”

“When are you going to do it I think you should do it soon you’ve been waiting so long and- and if you do it soon you can do it while Gianna’s here.”

They could. _They could._

Cristoforo was looking at with probably the exact same expression of surprise and quiet wonder that was on Gilbert’s own face.

“We must go tell her.”

“And I have to-”

_‘Tell Lutz’_ was the rest of that sentence, but he didn’t finish it, because he realized that he had a perfect opportunity. He grabbed Feliciano.

“Gilbert!”

“Marriage is _‘such a wonderful thing’_ huh?” he asked. “Glad to hear you say it. Now you can come _prove_ it. I’m gonna go up there and tell Gianna we’re getting married, and I’m gonna tell Lutz, and _you’re_ going apologize. You’re going to fix what you broke. If he tells you he never wants to see you again, you fuck off. If he says an apology isn’t enough, you’re going to figure out what _will_ be enough. If he asks you to grovel, you’re going to grovel.”

Ludwig would never ask Feliciano to grovel, and he actually felt a little sick at the idea of Ludwig seriously asking- it just wasn’t _right,_ not for his little brother. _Himself,_ though- Gilbert would gladly make Feliciano grovel.

“I-”

“Lavinia is not dead,” Cristoforo gently interrupted. “We have not been annihilated by the Pict. I am getting married. It is a very good day, and it could be even better.”

“I happen to be in a really good mood right now,” Gilbert told Feliciano. “So start fixing _your_ marriage, and I’ll call it a wedding present for _ours._ ”

Feliciano looked like he desperately wanted to be somewhere else.

“If you don’t agree me and Kit will figure out exactly how much guilty pressure we can exert.”

“Gilbert,” his fiancé said, mild reproval in his voice.

“I’m happy, you’re happy, I’m sure Nia’s beside herself with joy to hear the people she’s got a chance to see again, Feliciano said _he_ was happy- Lutz deserves to be happy too.”

Feliciano stiffened and for a second Gilbert thought it was the only warning he’d have before Feliciano tried to break out of his grip, but instead it seemed like he was steeling himself.

“You’re right,” Feliciano said quietly, to Gilbert’s deep surprise. “He deserves to be happy. I’ll try again.”

_‘Again?’_ Gilbert almost asked, but held his tongue. Feliciano _agreeing_ with him about Ludwig was unprecedented enough, and if he was going willingly-

He had a deep-seated desire to drag Feliciano up to his brother and throw him at Ludwig’s feet, but Ludwig wouldn’t like that, and this about making Ludwig feel better. If it rankled at him that his brother was almost certain to take his asshole of a spouse back with the bare minimum of apologizing, well- he was allowed. And if Feliciano fucked it up again, Gilbert would still be there. Ludwig would _not_ be alone.

And, this agreement- it meant something right now, even if later he’d look back on this with bitter disgust because nothing had really changed. This was a willingness to try; even _re-_ try, after whenever-it-had-been hadn’t worked the first time, the very thing he’d been waiting for- _expecting-_ from him.

Gilbert looked at Feliciano, silent consideration with the hint of a shadow of a moment of trust- such a delicate and easy to break thing, especially after all these years. He let go, unconvinced that the other wouldn’t run as soon as nothing was forcing him to stay.

Feliciano didn’t run.

* * *

Ludwig’s thoughts had gone back to running in useless circles, _‘Feliciano left’_ and _‘The Pict are gone but is Gilbert’_ and _‘Nia’s alive’_ and everything that Nico had said in his breakdown, changed now from hysteric babbling to huddling in the arms of his parents, and his emotions were following them. He couldn’t tell if he was happy or relieved or scared or heartbroken or how much of each he maybe was all at once. The only thing he knew for sure was that he wanted things to stop being so _complicated_ and to go back to the way they had been. He didn’t want to doubt and he didn’t want to worry, but here he was stuck with both.

They didn’t come in the door so he didn’t hear them arrive, and was startled out of his thoughts by Gilbert announcing that: “Today is a _very good_ day.”

It most definitely was _not,_ but his brother sounded so sure of it, happy and confident, and maybe he was just talking about the Pict being defeated but he was _here._ He’d survived it and he’d come back.

Ludwig looked up to say something and the words died even before he’d really considering them because there with Gilbert and Cristoforo was Feliciano, Feliciano who just this morning had said he was never going to see him again but was _here_ and _looking at him-_

“A _‘good day’,_ ” Lovino scoffed, likely holding Nico a little tighter.

“Lavinia is alive and we have not been annihilated by the Pict,” Cristoforo told him. “In the balance of how things _could_ have gone, it is a very good day indeed.”

_“And,”_ Gilbert said, sounding like he was about to burst with emotion- Ludwig wasn’t sure what exactly, it was something happy, but he’d have to look at his brother’s face to find out and right now he couldn’t take his eyes from Feliciano because Feliciano was _looking back at him_ with a sort of melancholy- God was that real longing or was he projecting? Was he projecting all of this? That could be caution and unease at being near him again, not melancholy, that made more sense. “We’re getting married!”

Gilbert and Cristoforo?

That was good. Gilbert had lost so much, and he’d been in love with Cristoforo for so long. He deserved that sort of happiness.

He was working up to looking away from Feliciano and getting up, standing and going to Gilbert and Cristoforo and hugging his brother and congratulating him, when Feliciano moved. He came up to the table, came up to _him;_ and warily reached for his hand. Ludwig tried very hard not to clutch at the contact, but he couldn’t tell if he’d managed or not because his heart was in his throat and Feliciano was looking so very, very hesitant.

_‘I won’t hurt you,’_ Ludwig wanted to promise, because Feliciano shouldn’t need to look like that at him; but he’d broken that promise so many times already and it did no good to say it now.

“Come on,” Feliciano told him, and tugged on his hand, and drew him out into the hallway. He closed the door and-

“Please don’t leave.”

He’d said it without any forethought whatsoever and stupid stupid stupid _stupid!_ He’d driven Feliciano off once today and even if he hadn’t he had _no right_ to ask for that, Amphitrite Kataiis had been first and she and Feliciano had had- centuries, maybe even more than a thousand years, together. _He_ was the intruder here.

Ludwig wanted to stop himself but Feliciano had come back, and he couldn’t bear to have him walk away so _finally_ again.

“I- no, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that I don’t have any right I- I’ll take whatever you can give me whatever you _want_ to give me if that means staying away from you and Amphitrite I’ll do it that’s fine-”

It _wasn’t_ it really wasn’t at _all_ and he had no illusions about how convincing of that he was being, and- he’d loathe himself for it forever but if Feliciano asked him to be his, his _side affair_ in his _real_ marriage he’d do it, he’d agree even with how absolutely wrong he knew it was because it meant he got to have _something._

“-just _tell me_ what you want, don’t just leave again without saying anything-”

“Ludwig,” Feliciano said, and there was a low, scared note in it. “No. Stop.”

Of course he would, absolutely.

…Feliciano was going to leave again. He’d ruined it again.

“I’m sorry I ran away,” Feliciano said, and what? “I heard everything you had to say and I ran away and I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have, I just- I was scared and it’s _stupid,_ because what you said, but- I _am_ scared.”

_No._

“I-”

There was a strange moment when Feliciano looked puzzled, like he’d seen something familiar but off in some subtle way, and Ludwig didn’t know what to make of it- but then Feliciano’s expression cleared.

“Ludwig, no,” he said, and they’d been standing within arm’s length because Feliciano hadn’t let go of his hand but now Feliciano stepped forward and closed that distance, resting his forehead against Ludwig’s chest. “It’s _not your fault._ This is _me. I’m_ the one who lied, _I’m_ the one who hurt you, and people have been telling me about how you’ve been like all month and I heard what you said b-but I _lied to you_ about _everything_ almost and that’s- that’s such a _big_ betrayal and I don’t deserve you back and I’m _still_ scared you’re going to yell at me and tell me to leave and not come back and I _know_ I deserve that and Nia and Gilbert would want you to-”

He was crying.

“I need you,” Ludwig told him, because maybe that _was_ all right. “What they want isn’t going to change that.”

Feliciano sniffed.

“I know.”

“It’s not about _‘deserving’_ ,” Ludwig said, because it needed to be said, and he could tell when Feliciano remembered the words because his breath caught. “Love doesn’t work that way.”

He’d have to remind Gilbert and Nia. Nia he could almost excuse, because she’d hadn’t had to live through the sort of total betrayal that had made Feliciano telling him this same thing a lifetime ago necessary. But Gilbert had held to it for him, and _he_ should have remembered.

“I just want you back,” Feliciano told him, voice quiet. “That’s all I’ve wanted since, since you collapsed in that meeting, even if it was just for a little bit and I’ve had this whole month and I _wasted_ it.”

“But you did come back.”

So much could be put aside, for that.

“Gilbert,” was the answer, and he hunched in on himself. Ludwig wanted to hug him, to hold him against whatever he was thinking. “Gilbert was going to make me and I was going to fight it but then I remembered you saying I was always running away and Cristoforo was there and he’d just said that Nia was alive and I- I want our family back. It’s been _so long_ and Nia and I have sort of fixed things and there was this moment and it seemed like Gilbert was going to give me a chance and if I _did_ run away again then people would just keep yelling and I- I _wanted_ to believe what you said and I’ve hurt you enough.”

Ludwig didn’t want to ask, because it might destroy this little bit of- maybe it was peace? Not worry, at least. He tried to cling to this moment just in case.

“And your wife?”

“ _Tesoro_ ,” and that sounded like a smile and even if it wasn’t the endearment made something inside him loosen, dissipated so much tension that he hadn’t realized he’d been living with. “She’s been after me since we first saw each other again to come talk to you and make up. She wants to meet you. We’ve been fighting about it.”

“Oh,” Ludwig said, and tried to shove away the thought that _they were fighting about it and if she wanted to meet me then Feliciano doesn’t want me to meet her, he doesn’t want me I should stop making him feel guilty so he takes me back_ because Feliciano had said that he wanted him back and he had to trust him on that. He had to trust him with this. “Then we should schedule that.”

Feliciano made a little _‘hm’_ of happiness, almost a laugh.

“What?”

When he looked up it was with that familiar fond loving smile that Ludwig had convinced himself he was never going to see again- but here it was, thank God.

“You’re just like I remember,” Feliciano said, and turned his face back into Ludwig’s chest, arms wrapping around him for a proper hug. “I’m so glad. I thought- maybe I’d forgotten. Maybe I was making things up because you were gone and I wanted you so much.”

“I’m sure you couldn’t really forget, _Spatzi_.”

As much good as hearing _‘tesoro’_ had done him, it was even better to say _‘Spatzi’_ again and have it answered with Feliciano cuddling closer.

“I’m sorry,” he said again. “Are you mad? It’s okay if you are, you don’t have to pretend you’re not.”

“I don’t hate you, _Spatzi._ I don’t think I could ever hate you. But I’m hurt.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I know.”

“But _are_ you mad?”

“I don’t know,” Ludwig told him. “Maybe. But you’re here.”

They held each other for a couple of minutes, until-

“I think we were kind of stupid about this, Ludwig.”

Ludwig sighed.

“Probably,” he said. Even if the entire first attempt at this conversation hadn’t gone so spectacularly badly in hindsight, now that _Feliciano was here and not leaving_ and he could think without panic getting in the way again, the sad fact was that they were pretty good at being bad at emotional discussions. They’d gotten better at it over time, and especially once they’d had children-

Oh.

“Feli?” and this was another thing he didn’t want to ask. “Your children?”

They’d come out to see him after their first attempt this morning, but there was a difference between curiosity and some minutes’ company, and adding a stranger to the family, much less one in his position.

Feliciano tensed up all over and his next exhale was almost a furious hiss.

“My _children_ are-”

A door opened down the hall, and Ludwig looked up.

“Nia.”


End file.
